The opposing side’s views and opinions

A huge wave of studies about the mental effects of video games have been conducted over the past two decades. Researchers often still debate over what kind of video games have caused these issues and whether or not these problems have been recently shown in the subjects or whether there’s an underlying cause to these problems. The general consensus from researchers has shown that video games only amplify negative emotions in players with issues that are already present. Unlike what many researchers claim, video games are in fact not the root cause of all of these issues, rather than the current underlying issues that are the true culprits to the player base. When studying the effects of video games on aggression, specific criteria must be met for the study to be a fair assessment of how people are affected. 

In the published study, “Consequences of Play: A Systematic Review of the Effects of Online Gaming” by Victoria Anne Sublette and Barbara Mullan, it is stated “However, more common physical and psychosocial effects attributed to online video gaming are social isolation, increased aggression, and negative academic and occupational consequences” these are simply generalizations made by the researchers in their attempts to prove games as being harmful towards their player base. Later on, in the same study by Sublette and Mullan, it is stated that “A study by Eastin and Griffiths (2006) found that hostile expectation ratings were highest in virtual reality (VR) games, although actual aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behavior were not affected by the type of game played; while an earlier study found no significant correlations between playing violent video games and levels of aggression (Williams and Skoric 2005)” this blatant contradiction in the study mentioned above statement and summarization of earlier studies in combination with their own shows that there have been no correlations towards violent games and aggressive behavior. This goes directly against the common belief that video games are the progenitor of many forms of offline aggression. 

Many more Researchers agree as M. Delisi, M. Vaughn, and J Shock said in their research paper, “Violent Video Games, Delinquency, and Youth Violence: New Evidence”, they claim that “The present study was designed to respond to these needs using a multifactorial risk factor approach focused on more serious violent delinquent behaviors among a correctional sample of serious male and female institutionalized delinquents” with this new found study that focuses on only the institutionalized it neglects the major population who don’t necessarily have a known issue already present. In the researchers’ attempt to prove the hypothesis correct that video games actually do cause offline aggression and violent tendencies in their player base; they use those who are already known to have aggressive tendencies. This pigeonhole makes it seem as if the study was set up to fail as studying the effects of media on aggressive behavior in those who have been placed in prison is a counterproductive assessment as it is safe to assume that those who are incarcerated also have a higher likely hood of being more aggressive than the average person.

The study titled “Does Playing Violent Video Games Induce Aggression? Empirical Evidence of a Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study” by researchers Weber, Rittenfield, and Mathiak a scientific study was done on a group of gamers and their brain’s reactions towards the stimuli they are receiving from the games they are playing. A quote contained in the study is, “which allowed for distinguishing between actions involving virtual violence and actions in which virtual violence was absent” This quote indicates that the study itself used a specific game for studying both aggressive and non-aggressive behaviors using one game to see the differences in brain activity between the “phases of play”. To see the full range that the brain can reach, different types of games should be played in order to tell how the brain interprets the stimuli and potentially processes some aggressive tendencies or lack thereof from different genres such as puzzle games like Tetris or open-world games like Grand Theft Auto. The difference in how these games affect people is very different as the absolute lack of violence in certain games can help provide a baseline control group for comparison to the violent games.

Grand Theft Auto is a major part of the thought process that violent games create violent people. In the research study, “Violent Video Games and Real-World Violence: Rhetoric versus Data”, written by Charlotte and Patrick Markey, and Julianna French the violent actions often associated with games like Call of Duty and multiple entries in the Grand Theft Auto series are brought up in their study in aggressive and violent actions being caused by games is brought up. These people have connections to these games by their crimes happening around when these games were released, and their crimes involve multiple homicides, rapes, and robberies. This study goes into how the releases of these games have affected the minds of the men who committed multiple violent acts. This, however, has been proven to be very muddled, and according to C. Ferguson and his article “Blazing Angels or Resident Evil? Can Violent Video Games be a Force for Good?” he states “Put simply, this issue notes that both public and scientific concern (Anderson, 2004, refers to violent video game effects as “somewhat alarming” p 120) is not matched by violent crime data, which for both adults and youth (Childstats.gov, 2008; FBI, 1951–2007) has plummeted at the same time as video games have increased in popularity” This large decline in violent crime data seen does not account for the almost exponential decrease in violent crimes among young men as these games increase in popularity. The large disparity between these studies and research depends entirely on who and how the study is processed. It also depends on who the studies follow as that can skew the study to a degree but generally, most studies now find that while some rises in aggression can be detected it is entirely negligible.

References

DeLisi M, Vaughn MG, Gentile DA, Anderson CA, Shook JJ. Violent Video Games, Delinquency, and Youth Violence: New Evidence. Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice. 2013;11(2):132-142. doi:10.1177/1541204012460874

Ferguson, C. J. (2010). Blazing Angels or Resident Evil? Can Violent Video Games be a Force for Good? Review of General Psychology, 14(2), 68-81. https://doi-org.ezproxy.rowan.edu/10.1037/a0018941

Sublette, V.A., Mullan, B. Consequences of Play: A Systematic Review of the Effects of Online Gaming. Int J Ment Health Addiction 10, 3–23 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11469-010-9304-3 

Markey, P. M., Markey, C. N., & French, J. E. (2015). Violent video games and real-world violence: Rhetoric versus data. Psychology of Popular Media Culture., 4(4), 277-295. doi:https://doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000030   

Rene Weber, Ute Ritterfeld & Klaus Mathiak (2006) Does Playing Violent Video Games Induce Aggression? Empirical Evidence of a Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study, Media Psychology, 8:1, 39-60, DOI: 10.1207/S1532785XMEP0801_4