Video Games and Violence: Next Great Social Dilemma or Political Hogwash
Over
the past few years, video games have become an increasingly popular choice in
an ever-growing entertainment field.
Where before video games were considered to be solely the province of
the nerds, geeks and disenfranchised; they have quickly become a viable
entertainment alternative for all people regardless of social strata. As a result of this shift, our children are
becoming increasingly exposed to video games, and in particular, video games
depicting different types of violent acts.
Video games as a whole have come under fire recently with people
claiming that violent video games are causing our children to become more
violent and aggressive. Much of this
outcry has stemmed from the fact that a large number of recent mass-shootings
have been perpetrated by people who could be referred to as avid gamers
(Ferguson, 770). Given this outcry it is
unsurprising the number of studies that have come out involving video games and
their effects on our children. As seen in
the evidence provided by numerous research teams from universities all around
the world, there is no conclusive evidence linking exposure to violent video
games to changes in aggressive/anti-social or prosocial/civil behaviors.
Professor
Christopher J Ferguson, currently of Stetson University, noted in his article
in the Journal of Youth and Adolescence,
"Video Games and Youth
Violence: A Prospective Analysis in Adolescents," there are three main
theories being used to describe the potential relationship between video games
and violence (379). For ease of
discussion I have named these views the casual view, the habitual view and the
outside view. The casual view is the
theory that exposure to violent video games leads to serious aggression and
violence in the players. Most of the argument
in today’s society involving video games stems from whether or not this theory
is true. The counterpoint to the casual
view is the habitual view. This theory
states that prior aggressive tendencies leads to violent video game use and not
the other way around. This theory also
goes on to explain that prior aggressive behavior is an indicator that such
behavior has a likelier potential to continue regardless of outside stimuli. The final view Ferguson talks about is the
outside view. This theory focuses on the
fact that any correlation between video game violence and aggressive behaviors
are by small in nature and are more likely the cause of underlying outside
influences like gender and peer and family influences (Ferguson, 380).
One of the biggest charges laid against
the video game industry is the thought that violent video games increase violence
and aggression in their players, particularly children. In a
study conducted by a research group led by Christopher J Ferguson regarding the
long term effects of violent video games and children it was found that there is
no concrete evidence supporting a long term relationship between violent video
games and aggression (Ferguson, 389). This
study also takes into account other outside variables including symptoms of
depression in both the children and parents, gender of the child, prior aggressive
behaviors, and family involvement and violence (Ferguson, 381). It is interesting to note that of the
participants in the study that showed behaviors of a more violent nature, the
majority of them showed signs of depressive behaviors before the study began.
Another study conducted by Ferguson and his
research team in 2013 attempted to determine if there were any correlating
behaviors, both good or bad, associated with long term exposure to violent
video games. As with his previous
studies, Ferguson attempted to quantify and minimize the effects of outside
influences, i.e. family attachment and violence, prior violent behaviors, and
depression in both subjects and their parents.
As with his previous study, it found that there is no evidence
supporting a direct correlation between violent video games and a proliferation
of positive or negative behaviors (Ferguson, 120). On an interesting side note, Ferguson expresses
a belief that instead of looking for what video games are doing to our children
we should instead look for what is causing them to make the choices that they
do. Ferguson also reiterates his findings
from his previous studies that the effect of family attachment and violence has
a higher impact on both positive and negative behaviors of children than
violent video game exposure alone.
On
the other side of the video game argument is the theory that video games have a
positive effect on children’s prosocial/civic minded behaviors. These behaviors include everything from
volunteering in the community to involvement in nation, state and local
issues. While many people look at these
two issues as being inversely related, the prosocial effects of video games are
infinitely more complex. Many of the
same video games that are described as violent and destructive have intricate
team building exercises built in ranging from online team based multiplayer
modes to immense raids and guilds where everyone has a job and is expected to
do their job and help out everywhere they can.
Professor
Christopher J Ferguson and his research team have also studied this side of the
social dichotomy of video games as well.
In 2010, Ferguson authored an article in Computers in Human Behavior titled "Call of (civic) duty: Action
games and civic behavior in a large sample of youth.” In this article Ferguson and his team studied
the effects that playing violent video games has on a child’s positive social
and civic behaviors as opposed to looking at it only from the negative
aspect. In support of his study,
Ferguson quotes statistics that he obtained showing the decrease of violent
crimes committed by children while the sale of video games as a whole increased
over a 10 year time frame (Ferguson, 771).
As in each of Ferguson’s other studies, he attempts to minimize the
effect of “third party” variables such as parental involvement and instead focus
specifically on the effects of the video games themselves. One interesting side note that Ferguson
mentions however is the fact that parents that are more involved with their
child’s video game experience tended to be more open and accepting of the game’s
violence when compared to a parent with less involvement (Ferguson, 773). Unlike many of Ferguson’s other studies, this
one proved to show a direct correlation between violent video games and an
increase in prosocial behavior observed in the subjects. Ferguson theorizes that this effect is due to
the fact that the majority of video games containing “violent” aspects also
have a large team based aspect as well.
Another article written by Morgan
Tear and Mark Nielsen from the University of Queensland, Australia covers
research that was conducted by their team looking for a correlation between
video games and prosocial behaviors. The
Australian team first sought to differentiate between types of violence in
video games and whether the actions you commit are morally defensible or
not. They then sought to determine
whether a violent video game with morally defensible actions had the same
effect on people as a video game with more morally-indefensible actions (Tear,
2). Tear’s team conducted their video
game experiment three different times with differing groups of people in an
attempt to find a correlation between video games and prosocial behaviors. At the end of their experiment the team concluded
that violent video games do not have a negative impact on prosocial behaviors
and that any previously raised concerns may in fact be disproportionate to the
actual effect that they might have.
As video games continue to become an
increasingly entrenched part of our daily lives, the content of those games
will continue to be scrutinized by researchers and the government to ensure
that we as a society are keeping on children safe from any negative
influences. As can be seen by the four
previous studies, violent video game content alone will not transform your
child from a mild mannered youth into a mass-murdering psychopath. Parental involvement in their children’s
lives, good role models and a good bit of common sense will see that the youth
of today will grow to be strong leaders for tomorrow.
Works Cited
Ferguson, Christopher J., et al. "Not Worth the Fuss After All?
Cross-sectional and Prospective Data on Violent Video Game Influences on
Aggression, Visuospatial Cognition and Mathematics Ability in a Sample of
Youth." Journal of Youth and Adolescence 42.1 (2013), 109 - 122.
Web. 17 November 2013.
---"Video Games and Youth Violence: A Prospective Analysis in
Adolescents." Journal of Youth & Adolescence 40.4 (2011),
377-391. Web. 17 November 2013.
---"Call of (civic) duty: Action games and civic behavior in a large
sample of youth." Computers in Human Behavior 27.2 (2011), 770-775.
We. 17 November 2013.
Tear, Morgan J. and Mark Nielsen. "Failure to Demonstrate That
Playing Violent Video Games Diminishes Prosocial Behavior." PLoS ONE
8.7 (2013), 1-7. Web. 17 November 2013.
No comments:
Post a Comment