New Study: Video Games Make You Violent?

Almost all gamers should be at least somewhat worried about this one, especially those in the USA. There has been talk about regulation of video games, and this report could be used to take a step towards that. Facts and criticism alike, here’s the report from FGN Online:

In a new report Professor Karen Dill claims to have found a definite link between games playing and aggressive behavior. “Aggressive behavior and hostile thoughts are significantly increased in players of violent videogames, ” she said. “They are more harmful than violent television or movies, because they are very engrossing and require the player to identify with the aggressor. In a sense they provide a complete learning environment for aggression. These result are very, very worrying.”

Dill, who has published various reports on the subject of the media and violence, teaches at Lenoir-Rhyne College, North Carolina, a school affiliated with the Lutheran church. The report, details of which are published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology today, comes a year after the Columbine High School shootings, which focused attention on the role of games in an increasingly violent society. The two teenagers responsible for the atrocity were keen players of first person shooters.

A parallel study, led by Dr Craig Anderson, focused on games players who had already shown violent tendencies. “Young men who are habitually aggressive may be especially vulnerable to the aggression-enhancing effects of repeated exposure to violent games,” he said.

One of the tests cited as proof of gaming’s effects involved game players punishing opponents post-gameplay, with various noise blasters. Players of shooters were more likely to punish harder, than players of Myst, by pressing the buttons for longer periods. Anderson concluded that long-term effects are “likely” to be longer lasting.

Today’s London Guardian asked a spokesman for the British Psychological Society for his view. “There have been a number of attempts to set up experiments like these and they have got absolutely nowhere. There is a world of difference between pressing a noise buzzer for longer, and shooting at your classmates,” he said.

Psychologist Dr Guy Cumberbatch, an expert in media violence, said the report is far from conclusive. “You cannot simulate in a laboratory the complex social problems that people are concerned about, and overall the actual evidence supporting a link between media violence and real violence is very weak,” he said.