Assignment 2- Juv. Delinquency - Essay Example

Grossman asserts that the major psychological processes that cause violence include classical conditioning, imitation and observation of vicarious role models in social learning, and operant conditioning. Grossman asserts that violence may be caused among children due to classical conditioning process. This happens through what children watch, see in movie theatres across the country and at home, exposing them to horrible, detailed suffering and killing of people. Children also learn to associate such suffering and killing with pleasure, entertainment, favorite candy bar, favorite drink, the close and intimate contact of their date.

I think this is true in all manner of reasoning (Grossman, 2009). Children are exposed to horror movies where human beings are slaughtered, butchered. These are then associated with entertainment, and ultimately impact on adolescents. Grossman has also indicated the effect of video games on children in terms of violence. Interactive video games that children play today are composed of firing ranges wit pop up targets and instant feedback. This aggravates children as they learn to target to kill.

Vietnam has a stimulus discriminator that is built to ensure that such games only allow shooting under authority, however, what children play as video games do not have such safeguards built in their conditioning. Therefore, they fire to kill at will, and this is impacting negatively on their psychology (Grossman, 2009). Imitation and observation of vicarious role models is another cause of violent behavior among juveniles. Grossman asserts that when children imitate or observe heroes kill, torture, they too like to try the same.

For example, models in the Hannibal the Cannibal, and the hosts of horrendous, sadistic murderers, have become major causes of violent behavior among children who imitate them. Children want to associate with them and at the end adopt a violent culture (Grossman, 2009). Generally, I agree with