Video Games Can Also Have Benefits

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Video games have been accused of contributing too many acts of violence or aggression for decades. What the media misses is that video games have many benefits we haven’t found in any other media. Society should stop being afraid of video games and instead start looking forward to how we can best use them to benefit ourselves and our children. Anyone who doesn’t understand why needs only take a quick look at our society. It is commonly known that many children in the United States play video games. Even many heads of households play video games, too. Society is changing and non-gamers are being left behind.
Those born between the 1970 and now are growing up playing video games. These young adults have participated in the rapid development of video games from the most simple of games like Pong all the way to games like the super-realistic BioShock. The game of pong was very simple while BioShock is anything but simple. There are dozens of genres of video games, but the most controversial of which are “first person shooters”. These games also have a focus on violent game play where the main objective is to shoot enemies. Today’s young adults play many of these and have gained skills from them that were never anticipated. Depending upon the type of games they play, they may have a greater ability to: track visual information, process and make quick decisions, focus and complete complex tasks.
Some of the most controversial video games are also the ones with the greatest potential benefits. Fast-paced, “first person shooters” has been accused of being too violent, but the benefits gamers gain from playing them are astounding. It is only common sense that the only way to get good at something is to practice. Baseball players didn’t be...

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...me a part of our culture and a part of our lives in many ways. As a society we need to focus our energy and attention on how to use them to make our lives better. We’ve already seen situations that show how video games can be used to help with tasks that have real world applications. New research about the benefits of video games is coming out every year. It is time for us all to step forward and embrace the technology around us that has so many benefits. And for us to work together to make games work to our advantage which will not ruin our society as some would say, but instead enhance it. There is one thing we need to do every once in a while. We need to sit down and pick up a controller. We leave ourselves at a disadvantage if we refuse to gain the benefits out of false concerns regarding violence and aggression. As we can all agree video games are here to stay.

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