BYU study: Reality shows showing loads of real aggression

PROVO — They may not be throwing punches, but reality television stars show plenty of aggression through name-calling, gossiping and sabotaging — far more than their scripted counterparts. A new BYU study found that reality television shows contained an average of 52 acts of aggression each hour, compared with 33 acts an hour for non-reality programs.

"(I figured they would) be about equal," said author Sarah Coyne, an assistant professor in the School of Family Life. "But then we found these whopping, whopping figures, and I just was blown away."

Coyne, who began the research while working in England, picked the top five reality shows and the top five non-reality shows (which included some American shows) and coded 120 hours of each.

She and a graduate student looked for any physical, verbal or relational aggression, including insults, yelling or "really dirty dealings," like those on "The Apprentice," which scored the highest with 85 aggressive acts an hour.

Yet of those 85, not one was a physical act of aggression, she said.

"American Idol" clocked in at 57 and "E.R." made the bottom of the non-reality list at 14 instances.

Soap operas, the most aggressive non-reality shows, had around 48 acts an hour, Coyne said.

The study will appear in June's issue of The Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media with BYU professor David Nelson also listed as an author.

"I think we need to widen our view in terms of aggression," Coyne said. "You get a (television sub) rating of V for violence, but some of these programs have gobs and gobs of aggression and you'd never receive an 'aggression' rating. The rating only focuses on physical types of aggression, as opposed to the (relational or verbal), which I think are more common in day-to-day relationships, and people would be more likely to imitate."

Today's ratings focus on violence, sexual content and language, but relational aggression is becoming more of an issue, especially given the increase in teen suicides due to intense bullying, said BYU communications professor Mark Callister, who studies media and adolescents and has collaborated with Coyne in the past.

"We've become, as a society, very sensitive to children who are being victimized in that way," he said. "(They become) very much the victim(s) of a lot of gossip, verbal aggressiveness. So it raises the question, where do they get exposed to this kind of relational aggression?"

And in the next breath, he answered his own question.

"Media is such an important part of their socialization," he said. "We do know from research that children do model behaviors that they see in the media, that it does have a profound impact on them."

Coyne clarified she is not against reality TV shows but only intends her research to be illuminating.

"The main message is just to recognize the stuff that goes on in these programs," she said. "They're not as innocuous as we think. Just because there's not physical violence in them doesn't mean there's not a ton of mean, spiteful behavior going on."

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