Essay - Violent Video Games and its effect on today’s youth

Shawn Khambatta
s2581302
1501ART

Videogames represent one of the fastest-growing parts of kids' media diet (Sweeting, 2005). Violence in video games is a rather new subject of discussion, yet it is a discussion of heated debate. Today, many people are worried about this ‘violence’ in our youth’s behavior.
Video games have become extremely popular over the last ten years, becoming one of children’s favorite activities. For example in a present study it was shown that adolescent boys play video games at an average of 13 hours a week whereas girls play for about 5 hours (Gentile, D. A. & Anderson, 2003). Back in the 1970’s and 1980’s, games like Pong and Pac-man were thought of as harmless and were therefore accepted by the public. Then in the early 1990’s violent games such as Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter came to be played by children. These games portrayed realistic human like characters engaging in battle in which they fought until death. These violent video games now rule the market. In fact, in 1998 a sample was taken of 33 popular Sega and Nintendo video games. It was found that 80% of these games were violent in nature (University Of Iowa, 2007).

Many video games since then have taken this ‘violence’ to a much higher and extreme level. A great example would be the grand theft auto series. These games promote violence, killing, breaking the law, destruction as well as degradation of women. (Sweeting, 2005). As a matter of fact, Grand Theft Auto 3 was not sold in Australia because of its rampant violence. The video game industry has recognized that males seem to enjoy violent video games more than females and have heavily targeted their games toward males (McGrath, 2000).

Gentile & Anderson (2003), state that playing video games may increase aggressive behaviour because violent acts are continually repeated throughout the video game. This method of repetition has long been considered an effective teaching method in reinforcing learning patterns. Students' level of exposure to violent video games is directly related to a variety of forms of aggression ranging from verbal aggression to outright violence. Not only that, It appears that not only does repeated exposure to violent video games increase aggressive behaviour, but it also decreases empathic helpful behaviour ( Barlow, 2007).

Part of the increase in aggressive behaviour is linked to the amount of time children are allowed to play video games. In one study by Walsh (2002), a majority of teens admitted that their parents do not impose a time limit on the number of hours they are allowed to play video games. The study also showed that most parents are unaware of the content or the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) rating of the video games their children play. Worse yet, parents may not know that the content of certain games could affect the social and emotional development of their child, and may even be hazardous to children's health (Kooijmans, 2004).

Another study was performed by David Walsh (2000) which showed negative association between the amount of time playing video games and the performance in school for children adolescents, and college students. He also stated that the amount of time playing video games is positively correlated with getting into physical fights, by many different measures. In short, teenagers who play more each week, play more yearly, and have played more over their lifetimes are more likely to have gotten into a fight in the past year than teenagers that play less.


Another negative impact is that players are rewarded for their violent acts. The interactive quality of video games differs from passively viewing television or movies because it allows players to become active participants in the game's script. (Gentile, D. A. & Anderson, 2003). Players benefit from engaging in acts of violence and are then able to move to the game's next level.

In yet another study, 210 college students were allowed to play Wolfenstein 3D, an extremely violent game, or Myst, a non-violent game. After a short time, it was found that the students who played the violent game punished an opponent for a longer period of time compared to the students who played the non violent game. It was shown that violent video games provide a forum for learning and practicing aggressive solutions to conflict situations. In short, playing a violent video game appears to affect aggression by priming aggressive thoughts. Despite the fact that this study was for a short term effect, longer term effects are likely to be possible as the “new age” player learns and practices new aggression-related scripts that can become more and more accessible for the real-life conflict that may arise (Anderson and Dil, 2000).

A growing number of children and teens now have the technological skills to customize the computer games. A recent development is putting “skins” on the characters in the games (Walsh, 2002). This means that the player can insert the images of real people and places thereby making the games even more realistic.

The advancement of video game research in the past decade has greatly helped our understanding of its effects on development. Unfortunately though, more research is still needed. The video game industry has grown to the proportions of the movie industry, and shows no sign of stopping. With each generation of games come more realistic graphics, more violence, bigger world, and more possibilities. In order to fully control the effect that it has on children today, we must first better understand the effect it has on the personality and behaviours, and not just in the areas of aggression and hostility. As we reach this understanding hopefully developers can create games which will help our youth, expand their minds, and shy away from the current trend of violence in video games

References :

Anderson, C. A., & Dill, K. E. . (2000). Video games and aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behavior in the laboratory and life.. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 78 (2), p772-790

Anonymous. (2006). Are violent videogames bad for you ?. Junior Scholastic. 109 (9), pg 7,1.

Barlow, D. (2007). Violent Video Game Effects on Children and Adolescents: Theory, Research, and Public Policy. The Education Digest. 72 (6), pg 79,2.

Gentile, D. A. & Anderson. (2003). Violent video games: The newest media violence hazard. Available: http://www.pamf.org/preteen/parents/videogames.html. Last accessed 9 May 2007.

McGrath, J. (2000). The Effects of Home Video Game Violence and Fantasy Portrayals upon Enjoyment and Emotional State: A Gender Comparison. Available: http://www.psu.edu/dept/medialab/research/vgviolence.html. Last accessed May 7 2007.

Paul Sweeting. (2005). Kids playing more videogames. Video Business. 25 (11), 1.

Thomas A. Kooijmans. (2004). Effects of Video Games on Aggressive Thoughts and Behaviours During Development. Available: http://www.personalityresearch.org/papers/kooijmans.html. Last accessed 7 may 2007.

University Of Iowa. (2007). Violent Behavior; Psychologists publish 3 new studies on violent video game effects on youths . Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week. 181 (1), 1.

Walsh, D. (2002). Video Game Violence and Public Policy. Available: http://culturalpolicy.uchicago.edu/conf2001/papers/walsh.html. Last accessed 7 may 2007.

Walsh, D. (2000). Interactive violence and children. Available: http://commerce.senate.gov/hearings/0321wal1.pdf. Last accessed 7 may 2007.