This study analyzed the effects of playing a violent computer game on emotional desensitization and aggressive behavior. College students (N = 58) were randomly assigned to play a violent game (VG) or a nonviolent game (NVG), and then were exposed to a set of emotional pictures. Participants' physiological responses were recorded, and the Self‐Assessment Manikin scale was used to assess affective valence and arousal while viewing the pictures. Participants were then asked to replay the game, after which aggressive behavior was measured. Participants' violent game habits (VGH) were also measured. We found that VG playing interacted with participants' VGH to influence aggression, and that self‐reported valence mediated this effect by lowering the feelings of pleasure and displeasure toward emotional stimuli.
his paper reports 2 studies of the own-anchor effect (i.e., assimilation in age, height, and weight estimates) in same- and cross-gender age, height, and weight estimates. The own-anchor effect is believed to be stronger for same-gender estimates, but the investigation reported here is the first to test this hypothesis with participants and target persons of both genders. Several own-anchor effects were found in females' same- and cross-gender estimates, whereas males only showed own-anchor effects in same-gender estimates. These results lean toward the possibility that women assimilate across gender, whereas men do not. Explanations of these results with reference to Krueger's (Krueger & Zeiger, 1993; Robbins & Krueger, 2005) theory of social projection and the consequences for witness reliability are discussed.