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The impact of video games
The effects of violent video games on the youth into
Videogames contribute to youth violence
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Video Games Encourage Teen Violence A sniper perched high in a eagle's nest zooms in through his scope to the head of his enemy, pulls the trigger, the enemy falls to the ground headless. This is a image that is common in the world of war, and now in the world of video games. Teens all over the world have become completely addicted to first person fighting games. With technology as great as it is today game makers are able to designed games that are so real it is truly scary. Millions of teens ( mostly male) play games in which they walk around various levels picking up weapons and killing ruthlessly their opponent. In the same day, we have teens walking around schools killing classmates ruthlessly. As an avid video game player I admit I have played many of the "shoot'em up" games. I completely agree that these games are fun and tend to feed the male ego. I also have played games that are too violent. Games wherein enemies bleed everywhere and almost nonstop. Games that you can see the opponent's facial expression before your shoot them between the eyes. I have even played a game in which there is a secret level that is modeled after Columbine. Do these violent video games influence teen violence? Probably the first violent video game was Death Race, which spawned in the 1970's. The object was to drive and kill as many pedestrians as possible. Early games such as Missile Command and Space Invaders both had to do with the destruction of the planet. (Violence, 375) With the onset of "Nintendo" the video game world exploded, going from one home console to a 6.1 billion dollar industry. In the 1980's video game companies designed games for every audience but many had a similar plot of violence. In a 1982 TV Guide eighteen po... ... middle of paper ... ...lves in our culture today. Teens are in a endless pursuit to discover who they are and want they want. Young people walk a thin line with confidence issues and moral dilemmas. I think that many teens are just violent by nature and will do things on their own free will. I believe that video games along with other sorts of media just seem to encourage youth violence. In short, I do not think that video games facilitate teen violence, I just think that it stirs the anger instilled in some violent youths. In the future, I think that better parenting, stronger regulation, and maybe a slower production of violent video games will help those teens that are affected by violent media. It is clear that there are established points on this matter. It is going to be solely up to the government, parents, and game companies to plan the attack of ending teen violence.
At this day in age we bask in the luxury of having easy access to advanced technology at our disposal. From the World Wide Web, to cell phones, music, movies and video games the human race has thought of any and everything to keep us entertained. Over the years studies have shown reasonable concerns regarding the long-term effects of video games. These games can desensitize gamers to real life violence, which is usually seen in the younger crowd. The studies especially hit on the games containing player-on-player violence. Though these games are extremely entertaining and can get kids to settle down for a while, if not properly supervised, they can produce adverse effects. Other studies have shown that video games can be used as way to yield positive outcomes such as, good problem solving skills, cooperation in a group and the ability to flow. Although there has been psychological research on children learning through the actions of others some believe that children are automatically able to distinguish between what is just a game and what is reality. The longer they are allowed on their game system the more they become convinced that their games are real. Some researchers believe violent video games can channel the aggression of the child but the parents are to blame for what happens to the child after playing an excessive amount over a period of time. Children can become preoccupied with these violent video games which have been proven to be the cause of poor social skills, uncontrollable aggression and a false reality.
Do you think kids get more and more violent after playing video games? I think that kids do get more violent and learn more negative things from video games. Such as when kids play games like Grand Theft Auto 5 and Call of Duty they want to shot and kill people. Games like Call of Duty and Grand Theft Auto are rated M for a reason. An M rated game means mature, so you have to be 17 or older to purchase. Young 13 year olds should not be playing these games and getting so much negativity out of the game. So I think video games do cause kids and teens to do violent things.
People have always been looking for a reason why horrible things happen. The media is quick to blame video games as the target and cause of many shootings that have occurred, ever since Columbine and Quake. People have been blaming video games for violence for years now, ever since violent video games have been made. News reports blame video games more and more for each shooting, telling the public how this person played video games for x amount of hours a day, and that video games caused him or her to shoot people, and how video games encourage and reward violence. Anti-video game lobbyists have been campaigning to have violence removed from video games, citing resources that they themselves have created as reasons for such, poorly done studies where they confirm that kids are more aggressive through how much hot sauce they put on someone’s fries. While unbiased studies of video games and their links to violence are hard to come by, recent research has shown that video games do not in fact have a casual link to violence, and may even have the opposite effect. Violent video games have nearly no link to violence in teens or adults.
In this day and age it seems as if America's youth is becoming more violent. Concern for those aspects in our society which influence violent acts has become an issue since the tragedy at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. Many feel one aspect of today's society affecting our nation's youth in a negative manner is video games. Is this form of entertainment really a factor in teen violence? I think not. Video games are not to blame for increased teen violence.
Video Games have been around since the early 1940s. Meaning people have been playing video games for at least the last 74 years. Based on research the first violent video game came out in 1976 known as Death Race. This game was described as sick and disturbing. Death Race was a driving game and you received points when you ran over people. Think that is violent, imagine the violence in the video games 28 years later. Violent video games affect the present and the future because they impact children’s mind, behavior, and education.
To begin, it is unquestionable that youth show more aggression when playing violent video games. According to the Director of the Center for the Study of Violence, Craig Anderson notes in his article, “The results, overall, have been fairly consistent across types of studies (experimental, cross-sectional, and longitudinal) and across visual media types (televisions, films, video games). There is a significant relationship between exposure to media violence and aggressive behavior. Exposing children and adolescents (or ‘youth’) to violent visual media increases the likelihood that they will engage in physical aggression against another person.” (FAQs on Violent Video Games and Other Media Violence, 2009).
It's a surprising fact that 90 percent of young boys and 40 percent of young girls play video games on a regular basis. The real question is how many of those young people play violent video games, and of those, how many have become more violent as a result? Although some people don't believe that violent video games are harmful to young boys and girls, they are harmful because they cause more aggressive behavior and they desensitize.
... methodologies and the intrusion of ideology and scientific dogma” (Ferguson 11). Violent Video Games do not cause increased violent tendencies in youth and adolescents due to the fact violent video games have been around for years and in those years violence caused by teens have actually been dropping rather than increasing. Also, violent video games have been shown through research that the negatives are highly outweighed by the positives. Also, with the introduction of interactive gaming there are a new range of possibilities for violent video games. Such as sending a message to children about healthy activities by getting them off of the couch. So hopefully in five years violent video games will have moved to full interactive gaming so that it looks more real-life, but more importantly that it will still be a form of media that helps to relive personal stress.
With all these violence that had been going on within 2011 and 2012, the media question the safety of children playing violence game. Can the shooting that occurred at Sandy Hook and Columbine be a link to violence video game? An article from Parenting.com, Sasha Emmons, 2013, discuss about the December’s horrific massacre in Newtown questions about guns in media and their connection to real-life violence. They brought up the topic about the killer of Sandy Hook, Adam Lanza play the violence game Call of Duty. They question how much should parents focus on their child concerning on their child aggressive copycat behavior (Emmons, 2013). Parents all over the world are concern about their children watching and playing violence game. Some parent report about their child behavior. Should they worries when their child would image that house hold supply to be a gun, going around the house making shooting noise?
Although violent video games are thought to encourage real world violence, they actually help to prevent it. I am focusing on violent video games and how they affect juveniles because I feel that this issue needs to be looked at in the criminal justice community. It is an unnecessary distraction to blame the actions of a disturbed youth on a form of entertainment that has been used by millions of people without incident. A review article published in The Psychiatric Quarterly found that many studies which claim to indicate an increase in aggression due to video games are, in fact, biased! Once the bias is taken into account, the studies no longer find any correlation between youths who play violent video games and youths who demonstate aggression and violent behavior. (Ferguson, 2014)
Video games have been a rapidly expanding industry since their inception in the 1970s. Along with their growth have come concerns about violent video games and their effects on aggression and violence in young people. The endless numbers of school shootings have pushed this issue to the forefront. These events brought about the question: do violent video games induce aggression in youth? That’s the question I set out to answer by looking at research. The research shows that there is a link between playing video games and increases in aggression in adolescents. What implications does this fact have ethically? It means that video game producers and distributors need to be held responsible for their releases and the way they end up in the hands of kids.
One reason video games don’t cause violence is that there are no solid proves. According to Michael D. Gallagher “The myth that video games cause violent behavior is undermined by scientific research and common sense”. According to FBI statistics, youth violence has declined in recent years as computer and video game popularity soared. There have been and increasing of 204% in Total US sales
Exposing someone to violent video games will train the person for doing violent actions that are shown in violent games. Grossman is a writer of two books on video game violence and thinks that video game is a major cause for violent teen behavior. On 1997 in a Paducah, Kentucky high school shoot out a 14 year boy shot eight people and five where headshots. This was believed to be a effect of the teen playing first person shooter games. The FBI say that trained law enforcement officers only land one out of five shots and this boy had no past experience shooting except for in the game. “Exposing children and adolescents (or "youth") to violent visual media increases the likelihood that they will engage in physical aggression against another person,” said expert Craig A. Anderson. Exposure to violent video games can cause a child to learn the...
Violent video games are special games, which negatively influences to the attitude and behavior. These video games are popular between children and teenagers. Since 1980-s years violent games are in political discussion. Because when teenagers usually play violent video games, they are becoming aggressive and then they face with psychological problems. For this, some people claim that violent games are harmful for society and they affect to behavior and health.
The question is, “Do violent video games influence children to act aggressively?” and “Can repetitive killing train a person to be violent himself?” Although the violence in these video games is fictional, research has proven the violence to lead to more aggressive behavior in children. Violent acts depicted in these games allow young children to believe that killing and fighting is acceptable and fun.