Music, Impact of Violence in

Violence in Music Today

Surprisingly few studies have systematically analyzed the content of music that teens listen to. In the only published study to look specifically at lyrics, Armstrong analyzed the content of 490 gangsta rap songs between 1987 and 1993. He found that 22% of the songs contained violent and misogynist lyrics. Of the songs with violence, assault was the most frequently occurring criminal offense (50%), followed by murder (31%), rape (11%), and rape and murder combined (8%). Armstrong argued that this sample represented an early period in gangsta rap's development and that current rap songs have become more explicitly violent in nature. To support this claim, Armstrong analyzed Eminem's top-selling album, Marshall Mathers LP, and found that 11 of the album's 14 songs (78%) contained violent lyrics. Thus, Armstrong's findings for the late 1980s and early 1990s presumably underrepresent how much violence is in rap and hip hop today. Other studies have analyzed music videos rather than just the lyrics, and they find that rap music is the genre that contains the most violence.

Impact of Violent Music on Hostility

Several studies show a relationship between listening to violent music and being aggressive. In one study, Rubin, West, and Mitchell surveyed 243 college students about their listening habits, emotions, aggressive attitudes, and attitudes toward women. Rap and heavy metal listeners exhibited significantly more aggressive attitudes than did fans of classic rock, rhythm and blues, country, and alternative rock. Studies have also shown that adolescents who report liking rap and heavy metal music are more likely to be suspended or expelled from school for behavior problems, to engage in delinquent behaviors, and to have arrest records. Such findings suggest a relationship between listening to violent music and acting aggressively, but the causal order of these variables is difficult to untangle. In other words, is it the rap and heavy metal music that causes aggressive behavior in adolescents? Or is it that troubled and aggressive teens are drawn to violent music genres? To sort this out, experiments are needed. In one of the most ambitious experimental tests, Anderson and colleagues exposed college students to violent or nonviolent songs in a series of five studies. The researchers found that songs with violent lyrics increased feelings of hostility in four of the five experiments, and this effect occurred across a range of humorous and nonhumorous songs.

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