Video Games And Its Effect On Children

Whether violent media content leads to real-life violence is always debatable. And in recent years, school shootings have made video games a new focus of public concern and scientific research. In public opinion, video games cause more aggression in comparison to traditional violent media contents because video games have more features of interactivity, "due to the active engagement and participation of players" (Hummer and Wang et al. 137). But more and more reports tell us that video games are not the main cause of school shooting issues; rather it is the negligence of parents, schools, and communities.

In my most recent essay I wrote of the violence attributed to video games in light of various shootings and other tragedies that occurred in the past year or so. In this essay I argued that despite their violent content, video games are not completely to blame for acts of violence committed by children. Throughout this essay I tried to convince the reader by, first, establishing my own credibility with video games, then sharing my own experiences with violent games, and providing both empirical data and valuable insight from trusted sources.

“Firstly, video games can serve as a central activity for interpersonal interaction, providing an activity for friends to participate together (like playing cards or engaging in physical recreation). Secondly, online video gamers can promote interaction with others across the game network and establish new friendships and thirdly, video games and their characters can provide a source of pseudo-social relationships for the game player” (cited in Barenthin and Van Puymbroeck, 2006).

In the late 90s, it seemed that school violence was on the rise as three separate devastating school shootings occurred over a three-year span. The most severe of the three due to the high death toll was the shooting at Columbine High School, also the one most associated with violent video game influence. The two assailant's levels of gaming expertise and their participation in online gaming was in question as motivation for their killing spree. It was this knowledge that sparked a media frenzy over who's to blame for the heinous acts being committed by these obviously troubled youths. However, other issues in these children's lives can contribute to a deeper explanation.

Since Columbine, in which two students carried out one of the most deadly school shootings in history. Video games, TV, and movies have been a sought-after target for acts of violence. After the Columbine shooting, the media thrust the idea that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold’s tendency for violent video games, not to mention screamo music and somewhat goth subculture, were partly to blame for the terrible day in history.

Over the years, the popularity of computer and video games has grown. Specifically violent video games make up more than 50 % of the top selling games. These games include violent themes that involve guns, crime, blood, and gore. There is an ongoing belief that these types of games are to blame for the many acts of violence in society and have encouraged America’s youth to act out in aggression. Several organizations, such as the PTC (Parents Television Council) have moved to discourage the development of violent games while also pushing for stronger regulations when purchasing such games. There is also debate among parents and concerns on how games can negatively influence their children. So is there a direct link between video games and violence? The truth is video games do not encourage violence in society based on several factors which include scientific studies, statistics on crime, and prevention measures adopted by game publishers.

Thinking about gamers who spend countless hours playing video games, most people usually wonder why these individuals choose not to do something more productive rather than burning their brain cells playing mindless video games. What most individuals don’t understand is that playing video games do not only affect behavior, but trains the brain to think and comprehend things better that an average person. Video games train the brain to see things that most people cannot see and are proven to make decisions faster without much complication.

Video games are a more interesting form of entertainment for the simple reason that players may become part of the game’s plot. Video games were invented for many years now. However, the current variety of games raised concerns about how they affect the children 's behavior due to the fact that the games are becoming more sophisticated. Children spend most of their free time playing video games. Sometimes children refrain from completing important duties and dedicate all of their time playing video games. PlayStation and Xbox are some of the most popular video game consoles and for the past 30 years video games took part of many people’s daily activities especially the children. The video games, graphics and capabilities have increased tremendously particularly in the last decade. The first generation of video games thirty years ago was just simple geometric shapes controlled by the game player. However, the latest generation of games has graphics and capabilities that mimic real life scenarios. Hence, the games became even more popular among children, more worryingly the games have characters that the children’s view as heroes and role models.

For many years, the age-old debate of whether video games lead to violence has caused dismay to parents and children alike. Parents because they fear for their child’s development and children because they fear the restrictions that will be put upon them. The topic itself falls into the much wider realm of censorship and how it should be handled regarding children. Many different types of media including things like television, social media, and video games have become sacrificial lambs for the most violent and aggressive acts that younger people commit. It is important that these distinctions be made to help concerned parents determine if they want their child to consume forms of media like video games and to keep others safe. The two

Video games in the 21st century have transformed from friendly competing into guns, explosions, and major violence. Video games are getting away with more violence every year and the games are becoming more extreme. The consistence and severity of violence is at an all-time high leading the most popular games in the gaming community to have a ‘mature’ rating due to the considerable amount of violence involved. For example, one of the highest selling video games of all time grossing one billion its first weekend, Grand Theft Auto 5, contains gang violence, nudity, and obscene language (Thier 2014). Although the extreme violence is rated accordingly for certain ages, parents often purchase these games for their kids not knowing what is

Video games do not help with education at all because they harm children. Video games can be connected to problems such as lost of human connection, and violence in children. The violence can be seen when it comes to comparing gun problems with the amount of games kids play these days. According to Cunningham, Scott, Benjamin Engelstatter, and Michael R. Ward, they found the connection between crimes and video games sales. They believe “Laboratory experiments have found evidence suggesting that violent video games increase aggression”. They show many examples of different games and crimes. This showing that video games do cause some aggression in people, thus making it a bad choice to use them in school. Another study was done connecting the relations between guns and games. This study

Quincy Barnhill walks down the endless hallways of Sweet Water High School as he can’t help but notice the grimy gray, metal lockers that seem to go on for miles.

On average, children under eighteen play about seven hours of video games every day. Two of the three top-selling video games in 2007 were Halo and Grand Theft Auto. These are both games whose descriptions include the words “blood,” “gore,” and “violence.” The violence in these games and the actions that the players take part in may be a harmful influence to the children and teenagers who play them. While playing video games, the players do not even realize that their emotions are flaring and that they are taking their character too seriously. Instead of keeping the character in the virtual reality, they are bringing the character’s traits to real life. When children are younger, they learn from what they see and hear. It might not seem like a big deal but they are learning certain characteristics from these games, especially violent ones, which can shape who they will become in the future. Parents need to be more cautious of the games they let their kids play and how the children spend their time. To the player, seven hours might not seem like a lot, but sitting in a dark room every day playing video games for that period of time has the potential to be dangerous to the player, mentally and physically. The amount of time children spend playing video games every day needs to decrease, especially the amount of time they are playing games in the violent video game category. Instead, parents should introduce children to games that are not rated “Mature” and that are more family

While video games have received much criticism for their lack of teaching qualities, there are many positive aspects to them. Video games are an excellent way for children to meet, interact with and socialize with new people from across the country and even the globe. Although video games are drawing kids inside more, and thus giving them a reason to not be as active as they once were; they are giving children a new space to express themselves and to grow their creativity to new levels as many of the activities performed are either dangerous or nearly impossible to do in real life. In her essay, Games and the Media: The Acquisition of Social Structure and Social Rules, Maria Heller argues that the violence experienced in video games has a negative impact on children, however from research I have conducted from other sources, video games, especially Minecraft, have a great enough positive impact to outweigh the negatives. Children collaborate online and share their ideas while also playing in the same “lobbies” to jointly work on different projects and to easily give their inputs to their friends.

In this day and age when you ask a child what they would like as a gift they can give you a list of a million things and this list changes every day. It should come as no surprise though with the way the toy market aggressively advertises towards children. They base the continuation of certain television shows based upon the sales of certain products, they create video games based around toys to generate interest on two fronts, and they even use food as a way to get toy names out. But what does that really do for our children? Kids from impoverish families know that they won’t be able to ever get money for the latest game console that all the other kids are excited for. They won’t don’t get to live the fantasy that the commercial projects.