The British Board of Film Classification welcomes the publication of the Home Office Study into the Effects of Video Violence on Young Offenders, which confirms and amplifies the Board's views about the way screen violence is interpreted by young offenders, particularly those with a violent family background. The research shows that most young people are not strongly influenced by video violence, but some could be, and they include the most violent and potentially dangerous young people in Britain. BBFC policy is focused on preventing the harm that might be caused by this minority of vulnerable and aggressive young people.
The Birmingham study was conceived by the BBFC as a follow-up to research by the Policy Studies Institute in 1993/4, which found that young offenders and non-offenders were choosing to watch the same films and videos, with a strong preference for macho heroics across both samples. The BBFC hypothesised that, because of their differences in background, the two groups might be interpreting the same material very differently, and this became the subject of the second stage of the research, undertaken by Dr Kevin Browne of Birmingham University. He has now confirmed that it is not just what people view but how they interpret it which makes the difference. Unlike ordinary teenagers, violent offenders seek out violent films and videos to reinforce and validate their own violent impulses. Teenagers with a violent family background are not only more interested in violence, they are also more likely to identify with the aggressor. They prefer macho heroes like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, who are more successfully violent than their opponents. But, as the research points out, such heroes provide dangerous role models for young offenders since, by demonstrating that violence wins, they confirm and reinforce the violent impulses that land so many young offenders before the courts.
Home Office backing enabled Dr Browne to gain access to 82 young offenders in custody so he could observe their viewing of videos appropriate to their own age group. The videos were selected by the BBFC, three classified '15' and three '18'. He also observed video viewings by 40 non-offenders of similar ages. He found that violent offenders were more likely to prefer violent films than non-offenders, and also more likely to identify with violent heroes. Two thirds of offenders, as against only a quarter of non-offenders, chose as their favourite actors those who play violent characters whose use of violence is applauded by the film. Yet it was violent parents that had the greatest influence. In the absence of parental violence, there was no significant relationship between offending and a preference for violent films or characters. The role of screen violence, therefore, is to reinforce pre-existing tendencies, probably by confirming distorted perceptions about appropriate means of responding to provocation. Given the tendency for offenders to seek out validation of their own violent impulses, it was worrying to find the authorities in secure institutions allowing offenders to see videos classified well above their age. It is clear that Young Offender Institutes have in the past taken little notice of BBFC categories and have little understanding of the role played by the media in influencing young people from violent backgrounds. The Home Office has indicated that more attention will be paid to this problem in future.
The final phase of BBFC research into the links between screen violence and juvenile crime will explore the fantasies of violent young offenders in order to investigate the ways in which images of media violence may fuel those fantasies or trigger their acting out.
Copies of the Board's Annual Report for 1996-97 are now available, including a section on Research.