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Tracking the Harm Games Do
Every so often, video games are accused of causing all sorts of negative behavior in children, teens, and adults. These accusations are typically predicated on statistics that sound much more damning than they actually are. In that vein, gaming website Rock, Paper, Shotgun did their own tongue-in-cheek statistical analysis, complete with pretty charts and graphs. Quoting:
"As part of my research I thought to compare the sales of each GTA game with what the divorce rate must have been when each came out. As you can see each new GTA game has been directly correlated with an increase in divorces. ... An often ignored statistic (and you have to ask why it’s being ignored by the games media, don’t you?) is the sheer volume of PC games being released. We’ve all noticed the British population is abandoning the church, turning instead toward shopping, DVDs and knife crime. But few have thought to check for a connection between PC sales and the numbers of people attending their local Church Of England church on a Sunday. When you look at the data there’s little doubt left that as the publishers continue to release more and more PC games each year, our nation’s faith is being increasingly eroded. And at what cost? If only a graph could tell us that."
An analyst reported that the effect was attributed to husbands drinking too much Hot Coffee.
This game will waste your life. Don't clicky!
There is actual research on the subject, if you are interested.
Here's the abstract:
Numerous studies have shown that exposure to media violence increases aggression, though the mechanisms of this effect have remained elusive. One theory posits that repeated exposure to media violence desensitizes viewers to real world violence, increasing aggression by blunting aversive reactions to violence and removing normal inhibitions against aggression. Theoretically, violence desensitization should be reflected in the amplitude of the P300 component of the event-related brain potential (ERP), which has been associated with activation of the aversive motivational system. In the current study, violent images elicited reduced P300 amplitudes among violent, as compared to nonviolent video game players. Additionally, this reduced brain response predicted increased aggressive behavior in a later task. Moreover, these effects held after controlling for individual differences in trait aggressiveness. These data are the first to link media violence exposure and aggressive behavior to brain processes hypothetically associated with desensitization.
Doesn't seem so far fetched.
There is also a correlation with global warming, illegal immigration and the number of natural disasters in Pakistan. We should ban all games immediately.
"Oh well this could maybe hypothetically desensitize people and cause problems, etc, etc." K, but that doesn't fit the actual data that violent crimes in the US have been trending down since around the time that videogames came out. The question shouldn't be "Can we try to find a contrived way that shows that video games might be related to perceptions of violence." The questions should be "Does playing video games make people more prone to act in a violent manner." If the answer is no, then who the fuck cares? There is no reason to be worrying about something if it isn't actually harmful.
As I said, first thing you have to account for in any of these cases is why violent crime has trended down. Just because it has doesn't mean that videogames might not increase violence, but you sure as hell have to account for that fact. You have to show that it would be even lower if video games were not around. You need to show that people who play violent video games are more likely to commit violent crime than those that don't.
Basically, if the only research out there is reaching extremely far to try and show minor differences in brain ERPs, then you've got nothing to go on. While that might be of academic interest, it is nothing to make any policy or law on. Only if games are actually causing more violent behavior, specifically illegal violent behavior (sports are violent but perfectly legal) is there a reason to have concern with regulating them because of it.
Does anyone else find it ironic that the loudest people who trumpet violence in the media as a source of inspiring violence in others tend to be religious groups and they are always calling for games and films that allegedly teach people aggression to be banned.
I would graciously accept the ban of all violent films, games, music and books if they would first pave the way by banning their own hatred and violence inducing holy book.
I thought I was *the one*...
Thank you sir, you keep just on going..
I can finally quit. The weight on my shoulders has been too much.. Now I can finally wear some pants, walk in the park.. read a bit.. play with the children of my siblings... be in public (I felt so misunderstood, nobody would understand how I was saving them!) and finally let my chafing wounds heal..
I CAN LIVE AGAIN! Thank you kind sir.
One thing that bugs me with all this study non-sense and the counter arguments is that they always have an extremely narrow field of view. It is either "they cause harm" or "they don't influence us at all", both are likely complete non-sense (even when done for humorous purpose as here).
What about general studies that simply discuss how child behaviour has changed over the years in more general terms instead of splitting it into good vs evil? Did video games cause less reading of books? Less watching of TV? Do people visit their friends more often due to the Wii or less often due to XboxLive? Or just how many hours spend kids with video games today compared to 10 or 20 years ago? How much of their allowance goes towards video games? How much power does a kid today use? Do they have a more realistic picture of war or a more twisted one? Did Google Earth improve geography skills and what not.
There are plenty of interesting questions that could be asked, where you could actually get at least some interesting result and people wouldn't all jump into defensive stance for their video games.