The Violence Profile is part of the Cultural Indicators project based at the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School for Communication. Cultural Indicators is a database and an ongoing research project that relates recurrent features of the world of television to viewer conceptions of reality. Its cumulative computer archive contains observations on 2,816 programs and 34,882 characters coded according to many thematic, demographic and action categories. The study is directed by George Gerbner at Penn in collaboration with Michael Morgan at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Nancy Signorielli at the University of Delaware. This is a preview of some highlights from the report.
Violence is a social relationship and demonstraction of power.
It shows who can get away with what against whom in a conflict. The formulas driving violence affect the total tone and context of programming. Women play one out of three characters in prime time, one out of four in Saturday morning children's programs, and one out of five in the news. With a predominantly male cast, and given the typical action scenario, the stage is set for stories of power, conflict, violence. The study also found that most of those who are underrepresented are also those who, when portrayed, suffer the worst fate.