Offended v. Offensive

"SMBC February 23, 2011." Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal. Web. 23 Feb 2011. .

Posted by Franki Simms

Is there any Evidence that Violent Video Games lead to Violence?

After tragedies such as Columbine and Virginia Tech, a media scare erupts looking for possible culprits that could explain such outrageous anger and hatred.  For the sake of the victims, answers deserve to be found.  However, all too often during this hysteria, finger pointing and scapegoats overrule sound reason.

A typical target has been violent video games.  Full of killing, blood, and gore, it seems intuitive to many people that such exposure must lead to some real-world aggression.

There are a myriad of studies and research papers that supposable conclude that video game play leads to violent behavior.  However, many of these studies are coming into question by modern psychologists.

Three professionals, Cheryl K. Olson, ScD, Lawrence Kutner, PhD, and Eugene V. Beresin, MD, write in a related article heavy criticizing these particular studies, “Correlational studies typically involve small, nonrepresentative samples, and assess playing time rather than game content. The terminology is vague, and some researchers use "aggression" and "violence" interchangeably, implying that one inevitably leads to the other. Studies done in the 1980s and 1990s are outdated because of rapidly evolving content and technologies. Recent studies that involve child or adolescent exposure to violent game content represent a tiny fraction of this literature.”

Patrick Kierkegaard of the University of Essex, writing in the International Journal of Liability and Scientific Enquiry says, “There is no obvious link between real-world violence statistics and the advent of video games. If anything, the effect seems to be the exact opposite and one might argue that video game usage has reduced real violence.”  

Despite such refutation against the popular opinion, there are still some correlations that draw concern.  Olsonm, Kutnerm, and Beresin also write, “It is likely that aggressive or hostile youths may be drawn to violent games. There is limited but suggestive evidence that persons with trait anger or aggression may be affected differently by violent games. In one study, players tended to be less angry after playing a violent game, but this was not true for subjects who scored high on trait anger and aggression.”

According to their surveys, violent children were drawn to violent video games.  In addition, such children may be more influenced by violent video games than other children. 

It’s important to note, however, that such correlational studies do no prove causation, and more research needs to be done on the topic to properly conclude anything.

In light of all this, there are some interesting questions that surface.  How should video games be censored, if at all?  What attitude should parents have when monitoring their children when it comes to violent video games?  

Sources:

http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/display/article/10168/54191

http://psychcentral.com/news/2008/05/15/questioning-the-link-between-video-games-and-violence/2299.html

~~Eric Basham

Food for Thought

http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/outsidestudies/main.asp

Just a link to a bunch of other links. But it's a collection of studies involving violence and sex in all kinds of media, ranging on topics from the accuracy of content warnings to the dangers of putting a television in an adolescent's bedroom. Keep in mind that it's a site titled "parentstv.org", so it may be a wee little bit biased, but I think it's good to put up here as a collection of counterpoints to what's to come, since we're the youthful, more "corrupted" point of view. We'll be referencing these later, I'm sure.

And on that note, here's a comic strip, because those are always fun!

Good stuff. There's sure to be some sort of correlation between seeing violence and acting out violence, something that Eric will be analyzing in the very near future. Look forward to it.

Posted by Josh Wallace

Sex and Violence Are Closely Linked in the Brain

For Valentine's Day....Science Proves Sex and Violence Are Closely Linked in the Brain

In summary:
Researchers at New York University have discovered that the cells responsible for aggressive behavior in the brains of mice  are suppressed during mating.  They identified the neurons in mice that that responsible for aggression and genetically modified them to respond to a blue light; when stimulated these, they noticed the mice became aggressive, attacking other mice and inanimate objects.  However, they also discovered that a number of cell types important for mating inhibited related aggression cells when the mice had sex.

Posted by Franki Simms