Video Game Violence Has a Negative Effect on Today's Youth Essay

While every gaming company is drowning in the money their violent video games bring in, there's people and or kids who are doing or are at risk of doing the violent actions in video games. Violent video games have extremely improved in how they look in the past years, like if people look at the graphics of an old PlayStation 2 system and compare it to a PlayStation 4 systems graphics there's a huge difference. With that big difference we got the new generation of gaming looking as it would in real life so people or kids in a matter of fact that are looking at this and thinking, “ dang this is cool I wonder if I could do this outside”. The reason for this is because the amount of gore or violent acts that people have at their disposal in the game such as Grand Theft Auto 5, where the character

Hundreds of studies have been done to determine whether violent video games will really make juveniles more violent. Randomized experiments were used in several studies to examine the short-term effect of violent video games (Anderson and Berkowitz et al. 90). In these studies, children were randomly assigned to play violent or nonviolent video games and then were observed when given an opportunity to be aggressive. The result was that children who played violent video games usually behaved aggressively.

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.

Video games have become very influential on children and adults (Stafford, 1999). With violent video games humans are more prone to act aggressively, to have aggressive thoughts and become numb towards violence (Harding, 2009). Apart from these they are

This article is a very useful source. Is useful because it answers the question, “Do violent video games cause an increase in aggression.” The question is answered thoroughly by the author because they cited recent studies, examples, and peer reviewed or scholarly sources that all concluded that violent video games cause an increase in aggression. The author is objective because they countered their argument by stating that

“According to data recently released by The NPD Group, in 2012, U.S. video game software sales reached $6.7 billion (174.8 million units) and computer game sales were $380 million (13.2 million units)” (Improving Economy). To many, the violent video game industry has turned all adolescents into mass murderers. However, they’re absolutely wrong. Very seldom do adolescents who play violent video games commit acts of violence, and the ones who do usually have a mental disorder. Instead of blaming the tragedies that occur on violent video games, the news media should explain to people that a large percentage of young males play violent video games, indicating that the two are uncorrelated. They should alternatively research other possible solutions to the crisis. In lieu of negatively affecting people’s lives, video games could potentially improve their lives!

“Approximately 90 percent of kids in the U.S. play video games, and more than 90 percent of those games involve mature content that includes violence.”-(Time Health). The link between violent media and aggression in video games has also created a spawn of research studies that has gone back and forth on the issue of whether

to begin, violence in video games are at an all time high. The acts and crimes you can commit range from, murder, rape, and assault. This demonstrates,especially to children and teens, that violence is okay and you commit all these horrible crimes with no consequences. In the article

Since violent video games, like Mortal Kombat, were created, adolescents who play these games become more aggressive than before. To me, playing violent video games is unsafe for these people since they have the negative influence on these people. I believe that researching on that topic would help us get the sense of what problems to avoid. I wish to know what are the possible effects of violent video games on adolescents’ aggression. The independent variable is violent video games, and the dependent variable is adolescents’ aggression. My hypothesis is that adolescents who play violent video games become very aggressive than those who don’t. For this essay, I would like to present the findings from each article that will answer

“Violent video games increase aggressive thoughts, angry feelings, and aggressive behaviors and decrease empathic feelings and prosocial behaviors” (Gregory Ferenstein). Gaming devices not only desensitize us, but it heightens our chances of going out and committing acts of violence. Such as, James Holmes because of the games that he played (Call of Duty, Advanced Warfare and etc.) he believed that for every person he killed; he would receive a point for doing so. “There are definitely games kids shouldn't be playing, she said, for example those where hunting down and killing people is the goal)” (Anne Harding, CNN). After playing these games, many kids feel as if the real world is like a game and killing people to earn points is rewarded. Video games have changed our America to believing that death and violence should be rewarded, but with a twist and that includes handcuffs and a prison

Although violent video games are thought to encourage real world violence, they actually help to prevent it. I am focusing on violent video games and how they affect juveniles because I feel that this issue needs to be looked at in the criminal justice community. It is an unnecessary distraction to blame the actions of a disturbed youth on a form of entertainment that has been used by millions of people without incident. A review article published in The Psychiatric Quarterly found that many studies which claim to indicate an increase in aggression due to video games are, in fact, biased! Once the bias is taken into account, the studies no longer find any correlation between youths who play violent video games and youths who

Some may object that violent video games does not affect the human’s behavior, but in fact exercises the brain. Take the example of the article of “Learning Theory, Video Games, and Popular Culture” written by Paul James Gee. He leads the article in a way where video games, good or bad, can lead us to good things as it process in our brain. For example, he states, “The content in a game like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas involves poverty, an African-American community, and crime. However, the game play involves solving problems strategically, problems like how to ride a bike through city streets so as to evade pursuing cars and follow a map to end up safely where you need to go” (197). As it explains that Grand theft Auto is labeled as a crime

Does exposure to violence in video games, on TV, and in social media have an effect on those exposed to it? Are those who are underage more susceptible to any detrimental side effects from viewing these things? This has long been a topic of discussion among lawmakers, psychologists, and the scientific field as a whole. It concerns parents and community members, especially in the wake of a seeming rise in violence at school from bullying, fighting, or in the extreme cases of school shootings. Were any of these types of incidents encouraged by exposure to violence in media?

“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

Violent video games provide an emotional outlet for inherent violent thoughts and feelings, which essentially deters crime. A study regarding the subject of violent youth activity found that “between 1994 and 2010 the number of violent crimes among youth offenders fell by more than half, to 224 crimes per population of 100,000. At the same time, sales of video games have more than doubled since 1996” (Corriea). These statistics communicate the idea that violent video games actually decrease the chance for people in general who express interest in violence to commit violent acts in real life, as their time will be spent engrossed