Violent Video Games - Affecting Aggression in our Youth?
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/family/11/03/healthmag.violent.video.kids/index.html
This summary is an analysis of an ongoing study in the behaviour of children, aged 9-12, 12-15,13-18 across 2 different countries, USA and Japan. Researchers have found that violent games do provoke more aggressive thoughts in children, but not in a way that one might assume. It is a gradual change in personality, that takes place over a long period of time. Certain children are more perceptible to this behaviour, yet most are generally able to suppress their thoughts that originate from these games. There are 2 main ways that violent video games affect the behaviour of children negatively. First, a child will merge his or her thoughts from in the game, with the real world. In a game, the world is a hostile place, where aggression is the way to deal with problems. A child may mistakenly associate this with the real world, and beleive that violence is an O.K way to deal with issues. The second is slightly more complex. In this situation, a child becomes desensitized to violence, and the goriness/stigma of it all wears off, leaving them less perceptible to it's negative thought invoking power. In this manner, violence and gore lose their power to bring fear, and seem like everyday things.
What's the big picture?
The article lists a few ways in which the current situation can improve. The first being the fact that the Mature (+15) rating needs to be reinforced more at vendors. Teens below this age, and children, are free to buy games of this ESRB rating at many stores, with the storekeepers simply seeking the profit motive. Keeping these sort of games out of the hands of younger children is simply the number one way to solve/better this issue. Common sense is key in this solution. What parent in their right mind wants their child shooting gangsters at the tender age of 9 or 10? The second idea they put forward, is to put the gaming system or computer in a publicly shared area, such as the living room, instead of in the child's personal bedroom. In this way, the parents can monitor what the child does, and can make sure that they can lay down the proper context for what happens.
How does this affect me?
To be honest, I have played quite a host of these "violent" video games in my time, but personally don't feel like an aggressive person. In my opinion, it just takes that one perfect mix of factors, just as another article explains with the tragic stories of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold in Colorado, to create a hostile situation in which fiction becomes reality.
