The Negative Effects Of Violent Video Games On Children's Behavior

A huge controversy in today’s society is violent video games and their behavioral effect on the children and adults who play them. Violent video games have been blamed for bullying, school shootings, and even violence towards women. Many have fought that violent video games desensitize players to real-life violence, and that they are teaching the youth that violence is an acceptable conflict-solving strategy. Other sources have stated otherwise. The 2004 Secret Service has stated that only one-eighth of attackers have exhibited interests in video games. Violent Video games do not cause violent behavior or behavior problems because it has not been proven that there is a link between violent video games and behavioral issues, playing video games provide a safe outlet for aggressive and angry feelings and reduces violence in young children, and violent juvenile crime has actually gone down since the violent video game popularity has increased.

While violent video games have increased as a form of entertainment, an issue has begun to form on whether violent video games have a negative impact on children and adolescents. Steven F. Gruel (2010) formed an argument about the negative impacts of violent video games on children. The purpose of this paper is to critique Gruel’s argument by finding flaws and strengths using the methods of claims without data, overgeneralization, failing to cite sources, and considering alternative explanations.

Video game effects are relatively new in modern society. Even though these games are often entertaining, the content of the game has been increasingly more and more violent as technology becomes more prevalent. The popularity of violent video games has caused an increase in controversy. Parents and experts feel that some games are just too violent and they demand the government to regulate the sales of these games. However, violent video games do not cause an increase in aggression, in adolescents. The forceful plan by the government is caused by an exaggeration of the effects of violent video games and this plan are indeed pointless.

One of the big issues that is growing in todays’ society is Violent video games effect negatively on youngsters. This issue is growing because many of these games are featured aggressive elements that lead youngsters towards violence. For most players, video games are fun but also violent games take over the lives of some player. Since the world of video games was started in the 1980s, the video games still getting new level of popularity in this world. Most people are getting really addictive of these violent video games. The first important reason why violent video games are dangerous for children is that they spend their most time on playing video games and don’t pay attention in real world. After a while they start to live in fantasy world. The second reason is violent video games caused mental disturbance in children. Because children spent their most of the time on playing video games, they are most likely to skip school and have poor grades. The most important reason is that violent video games can effect on children’s behavior. These games leads towards aggressive behavior that can be dangerous for others.

Today, you are most likely to see that the first item on a child's christmas list is any video console with violent video games included. For the most part, nobody actually pays attention to the harm they could be exposing their young kids to or maybe they do not notice until it is too late. Its irrational to think that a violent video game would not be able to psychologically and silently affect the mind of a young kid, as it is also causing the kid joy at the same time. But this irrational idea can be proven wrong through research about the effect that violent video games cause on young kids. This effect, that the research mentions, can negatively impact their lives at a young age. Research from different association state that violent games can increase the rate of kids fighting among their communities up to actually committing real crimes. Violent video games also affect the children's emotion toward certain topics such about crimes, fighting, and mass shootings. In certain, video games that portray women getting sexually or physically abuse, can also lead to them doing this certain actions as they grow older. The young kids start to lower their empathy and kindness toward family members, friends, and any person they interact with. Yes, every situation is different, but young children are still exposed to the danger that violent video games have, and their effect on the kids mind. Even though it all depends on the person and how deep they take the video games, but this

The possible harmful side effects of violent video games has been long debated for many years, especially in light of recent tragedies such as the Columbine shootings which was initially thought to have been caused by excessive violent video game play. Over the years, many professional health associations have joined in agreement of these harmful effects (Anderson, Ihori, Bushman, Rothstein, Shibuya, Swing, Sakamoto & Saleem, 2010). Past research has revealed evidence that violent video games and media violence increases the likelihood of aggressive and violent behavior in both short and long term contexts (Anderson & Dill, 2000). However, because video game violence is a newer phenomenon with this technology emerging in the late 80’s and early 90”s, research is still very limited (Anderson et al., 2010). Nevertheless, Anderson and Dill (2000) produced two quantitative research studies in their published article, “Video Games and Aggressive Thoughts, Feelings, and Behavior in the Laboratory and in Life” using the General Affective Aggressive Model formulation, which revealed a correlation between video game violence and increased aggressive behaviors in both long and short term frameworks.

advanced, it was very difficult to create images that are commonly seen in our societies today. As one writer puts it, the reality of virtual games is so improved that the characters are able to perform real life reactions to an effect. For example, when a character is shot in the neck, he falls to the ground face down clutching to his throat. Sometimes when the character is shot, a large spray of blood covers the walls and the floor where the body of character lies. In other instances where explosives are used, the character burst into small but recognizable body parts (Shin).

As we enter the 21st Century, video games are becoming more popular each and everyday. People of all ages can and do enjoy video games as a way to spend there free-time. These games allow the player to live in the game whether it's about sports or a role playing game. The problem with the video games in the market is that they are becoming too violent in some people's minds. Also, many of these violent video games are being advertised and directed to America's children. This is my question for America; can video games influence violence and aggression in children? In this paper, I will include American's view on this issue, what tests have shown and what the video game industry has to say

The topic of violence in video games has been a highly controversial conversation for many years. According to a 2010 Kaiser Family Foundation study, 10 hours and 45 minutes on average are spent per day using technology among all 8- to 18-year-olds, which is over a 2 hour increase over the past five years (Rideout et al, 2010, 2). Exposure to violent video games is significantly linked to increases in aggressive behavior, aggressive cognition, and delinquency and decreases in prosocial and helping behavior (Anderson, 2004, 118), consistent with the General Affective Aggression Model. This model predicts the short and long term effects of violent video games on aggressive behavior. Many experiments have proven this, though there are some researchers who think that the results may be flawed and that the research needs to be corrected.

In the 1950’s parents were thrown into a panic because of the possible negative affects rock and roll music could have on their children. Much like the bad reputation rock and roll music received in the 1950’s, violent video games have been questioned and looked down upon as a newer form of influential media. Violent video games have been blamed for bullying, school shootings, increasing rape, and increasing the amount of women being abused. Despite the popular belief that video games can be very harmful to a child’s mind and cause violent behavior, video games don’t cause as much psychological damage to children as people have been trying to claim. Because there are too many factors to consider, and there is a lack of evidence proving that video games cause children to become more aggressive, violent video games can’t be at fault for increasing youth violence.

What images pop up in your head when you hear the word aggression? Have you ever thought whether violence portrayed in different forms of media make people more aggressive? The immediate reaction to such a word is fighting or violence. Many issues are determinants of aggression but media violence has played a huge role in influencing aggressive behavior. Over the past years, aggression has been tied to numerous video games that are violent in many different ways. Aggression has been defined as “behavior motivated by feelings of anger and hostility and whose primary aim is to harm another, either physically or psychologically (Gilovich, Keltner, Chen & Nisbett, 2016). Even though individuals do not realize, many aspects pertaining to violent video games have been thought to be correlated with aggression in individuals who play them. Some issues include how violent they are, how long the games are engaged in and what age the individual is. In this present paper, the timing of a violent video game and its role in influencing aggression, is investigated.

Hamilton-Giachritsis (2005), Erwin and Morton (2008), Gentile and Stone (2005), and Jason et al. (2005) revealed a correlation between violent video games with immediate and later aggressive behavior. All of the research for the effects of violent videos games are conducted on older children and current research has not yet studied young children or preschoolers. It is important to note what research exclaims about the long-term effects violent video games can have on children later in life during adolescence (Anderson et al., 2008; Gentile & Stone, 2005; Kirkorian, Wartella, & Anderson, 2008). Anderson et al. (2008) and Gentile (2014) reported, 90% of American

The future of entertainment is greatly entrenched in technology and video games are an integral part of this. Video gaming is utilized as a great pastime and leisure activity by many people across the world. The number of people who play video games is particularly high among adolescents with a recent survey showing that 97% of Americans aged between 12-17 regularly play video games (Wittek et al, 2016). However, despite the entertainment benefits of video games, overplaying violent video games negatively impacts of teenagers and adolescents. The purpose of this paper is to explore the negative impacts of excessive violent video gaming on adolescents with the sole aim of informing classmates on the disastrous effects of overplaying violent video games.

The promotion of violence by today’s media, especially video games, has caused violence and aggression in reality to become a major concern. As gaming graphics and special effects are becoming more realistic, this portrayal of violence is one of the many important concerns in society. These days, a person can pick up a controller, move a joystick around, press a few buttons, and totally devastate an entire city. The recent uproar about this kind of entertainment is based on the debate of whether or not violence is affecting children who spend countless hours playing violent video games. Some people claim that the violence in the media has influenced horrible acts, such as many

“Recent contents analyses of video games show that many as 89% of games contain some violent contents” (Gentile, Lynch, Linder, Walsh 3). More than half of video games being sold around the world contain some form of violence. All of the violence involved in the video games being played by children is a pattern leading to aggression. Aggression can be caused by many things; however, violent video games are the main cause of aggression in young adults. “If a child began playing violent video games at a young age, then he might think that violence in real life is the same as the game violence and that it doesn’t have a real impact on others” (Gilad, Alto 1). Thinking that violence in the virtual world is the same as in the real world is the first step to showing aggression. Aggression in children caused by video games is the biggest effect parents and researchers worry about. Violent video games teach children that shooting and killing people are