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The relationship between the timing and outcomes of the Washington Redskins' football games and the frequency of admissions to hospital emergency rooms in northern Virginia is investigated. An OLS time series analysis is conducted, controlling for days of the week, months, years and special holidays for 1988-1989. The results indicate that the frequency of admissions of women victims of gun shots, stabbings, assaults, falls, lacerations and being struck by objects increases when the team wins. We hypothesize that many of these injuries are the result of battering and that having a favorite team win may act as a trigger for assault in some males. We suggest that viewing the successful use of violent acts may give the identifying fan a sense of license to dominate his surroundings.
We investigated the hypothesis that under some circumstances, presentations of media violence produce violent actions in the viewers. Specifically, we examined the association between the timing of professional football games (Washington Redskins) and the frequency of emergency room admissions in northern Virginia. Our focus is on the frequency of emergency room admissions of women for traumas resulting from assaultive acts, which we suggest may be delivered mostly by intimate companions. Surprisingly, we found that an increase in admissions was not associated with the occurrence of football games in general, nor with watching a favorite team lose. The frequency of women's admissions increased significantly only after team victories.
BATTERING RELATIONSHIPS
The recent recognition of wife battering as a significant social problem has led to a proliferation of research in the last 20 years. Prior to this time battering was largely either ignored or defined as a "nonproblem" (e.g., appropriate behavior on the part of a husband to control and discipline members of his household).
Now much more is known about its prevalence, and feminist scholars, clinicians and social scientists have begun to study its causes and the efficacy of existing social controls.
Studies of etiology range from structural to ideological, from sociological to psychological, and from legal to medical. At its broadest level, theorists have identified cultural, ideological or structural factors which promote, or create a climate conducive to, battering women. The existence of patriarchy, violence, economic dependency of women, traditional religious tenets, and the definition of family...