Audience Theory: The Bobo Doll Experiment

This is a very controversial piece of research that children copy violent behaviour, conducted by Albert Bandura in 1961.

Children watched a video where an adult violently attacked a clown toy called a Bobo doll.

The children were then taken to a room with attractive toys that they were no permitted to touch.

88% of the children attacked the Bobo Doll when taken into another room. 8 months later 40% attacked the dolls.

The conclusion reached was that children will imitate violent media content.

The effects model (backed up by the experiment) is still the dominant theory used by politicians, some parts of the media and some r

eligious organisations in attributing violence to the consumption of media texts.

Key examples sited as causing or being contributing factors are:

• The film Child's Play 3 in the murder of James Bulger in 1993.
• The game Manhunt in the murder of Stefan Pakeerah in 2004 by his friend Warren LeBlanc.
• The film A Clockwork Orange (1971) in a number of rapes and violent attacks.
• The film Severance (2006) on the murder of Simon Everitt.

In each case there was a media and political outcry for the texts to be banned. In some cases laws were changed, films banned, and newspapers demanded the burning of films. Subsequently, in each case it was found that no case could be proven to demonstrate a link between the text and the violent acts.