Do Video Games Cause Violence

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The first incident of massacre by gamers was recorded in 1993; the criminals who were accused played this game called "Doom." Porter et al. state in their article- "Are violent games harmful," that these two criminals wanted their own massacre to be "just like doom (423)." The criminals managed to kill "12 students and one teacher, before committing suicide (Porter et al. 423)." As 20 years have passed since then and games like Doom have been evolved to become more violent and realistic. There have been many assaults since then relating gamers and violence, and this has made scholars, media and gamers wonder whether games cause aggression. Even though researchers have done various methods and experiments to see if video games cause violence, …show more content…

Ferguson et al. did a study where around 100 students played random video games; in which they take up a role of a good character in one game while the other take the evil character (99). At the end, his results showed that these video games had no effect on aggressive behavior. In fact, the results showed decreased hostile feelings and decreased depression (105). Similarly, Julia Kneer adds onto Furguson by explaining that aggression is not cause by these gamers as "digital players and communities strictly distance themselves from school shootings. " Kneer et al believes media and older people are creating speculations that gaming causes aggression, and these gamers know the difference between the imaginary and real world (251). She says, "Young adult do not play digital video games themselves (253)." She is rebutting to what Montag had said earlier about how online video gamers play games to get out of the real world as they have dissatisfaction. But Kneer et al say that playing games as groups can be a form of social interaction (253). Simultaneously, Maria Frostling Henningsson goes against Chen and Emily Collins who said that gamers become shy and timid. She supports by saying that through online gaming, gamers connect to new people in "unexpected ways (558).". Hussain et all. in their article support Frostling by saying that the positive effects of gaming include "meeting new people, learning about new cultures, building friendship and teamwork (750)." In conclusion, all three, Frostling, Kneer and Hussain are stating that gamers do not go through social isolation, but in fact, their social skills build up and they can relate to other new people. Hussain et al. also go against Porter, as Porter et al. say that gaming worsens academic grades for these gamer, but Hussain states that online gaming improves efficiency, which is a good tool

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