Video Games: Let The Game Begin !

    This article by KidsHealth's "Are Video Games Bad for Me?", I learned many bad side effects of too much gaming. I read that you can become overweight. It also stated "It's hard to get enough active play and exercise if you're always inside playing video games." This means you could become very unfit for physical actions (like construction or picking up things). It also wrote "...may lead to health problems." This could show how you could have a

In just two decades, the prevalence of obesity doubled for U.S. children ages 6 to 11, and tripled for American teenagers (Childhood Obesity). Obesity is an excessive accumulation of fat causing a person to become overweight. It is a serious and growing health problem, especially for kids. One major factor to the problem of children becoming obese is, video games. Video games have advanced dramatically over the years. From hitting a ball back and forth in the game “Pong,” and eating little dots in the game “Pac Man,” to first person shooters, and sport simulation games that look like you’re watching a game on TV. Even within the past six years, video games have advanced a lot.

Video games are generally seen as a waste of time and nothing good can come out of playing them. People usually associate video games with nerds and adults who stay in the basements of their parent’s house. With all these negative associations with video games, it is hard to see that video games can actually be helpful and beneficial to an individual’s mental and physical health.

While video games may be a fun distraction, playing them too often, as many people tend to do these days, is unhealthy, uneducational, and possibly even dangerous. The rise of technology over the past few decades has led to countless new ways of communicating and working, as well as countless new ways of distracting oneself from communicating and working. Video games are simply one of these methods of distraction. Although they can be a great way to destress when played every once in a while, the fact that they are now available on a huge variety of different devices, including mobile phones, means that most people now play them every day, multiple times a day. The amount of time, energy, and money people spend on these games is infinite, and can only lead them to another virtual level, rather than taking them anywhere in real life. I believe that there are many benefits to playing video games, but that focusing on them too much cannot be good for anybody.

Video games have become a very popular hobby that anyone can obtain the skill at any point of people’s lives. Video games are a game played by electronically influencing images produced by a computer program on a television screen. In October 1958, William Higinbotham has created the very first videogame. Studies have shown that video games are actually healthy, and these studies can prove wrong what the older generations assume about video games. Although, older people that grew up with a different hobby that was not video games, there many things that videogames can help improve certain skills a human can strengthen.

Thesis Statement: Though video games have a controversial and sometimes negative reputation, when used correctly they can benefit a person’s emotional wellbeing, motor skills, and potentially aid their health through video game exercising.

Many people are playing video games that are affecting their health. Video games are affecting many people’s health. According to an article in the Journal of Neurology, Neuropsychology and Psychiatry, “29 percent of patients with epilepsy suffered videogame-induced seizures.” (DeLoatch et al.)Patients with epilepsy would risk their health just play a video game. This shows that these addicting video game are putting people’s life’s at major risk.

However, people are working out ways to use video games as a way to encourage kids to exercise. Figures reveal a strong positive correlation between hours spent on TV and video game indulgence and the percentage of children classed as overweight per state. The state of Utah was acclaimed the lowest percentage of children who are overweight, and was found to have the second lowest percentage of children spending two or more hours on TV and video game exposure. The District of Columbia had the highest percentage of overweight children, and the highest percentage nationwide of children spending four hours or more in front of a screen. The research was taken after a study revealed that children were six times more likely to take to exercise if it involved a video game. Regular exercise and interactive games, which depended on the children exercising, where provided as free choices to children. Ten percent of active time was spent on kid’s fitness equipment compared with sixty percent on identical machines connected through Gamercize products to a games console, the remaining thirty percent spent with traditional games and magazines. The results of this experiment have been hailed by health experts as a huge step forward in working towards reducing obesity among today's youth.

The United States of America contain about 123,229,000 households. Out of about 123,229,000 four out of five of the households have a system used to play video games. Also, forty-two percent of Americans play for at least three hours a week. The average eight to twelve year-old plays video games for thirteen hours a week. While the average eighteen year-old play video games fourteen hours a week. Many have claimed that they have had problems in their fingers. After a while many people have wondered if playing video games has an effect on the muscles and bones in your fingers. Yes, playing video games have many effects on your fingers. It can cause irritation to the muscles in your fingers. Video games can cause osteoarthritis and carpal

In the opposition’s point of view, games often lead to poor health for the person playing the game. This comes from the fact that most games involve sitting in front of the TV (“Eight Ways Video Games Are Bad For Your Health,” par. 1). Most of the games out on the market today are plain and simple. The user grabs a controller and sits in front of the TV and begins to play the game. This is all true but, there are games that require physical motion like

These games show that the use of games targeted at health can be beneficial, but the effects of recreational video games can also be beneficial for health. Steve Dorman of the Journal of School Health suggests that the potential negative consequences of video games are cardiovascular implications, stating that, “American children are more overweight, slower, and weaker than their counterparts in other developed nations” (*). And states that, “Video games and television viewing may contribute to a sedentary lifestyle by displacing involvement in sport and other physical activity” (*). To determine the effects of playing video games on health, a laboratory assessed the heart rate, blood pressure and oxygen consumption of Ms. Pac-Man players over a 30- minute duration and compared them to the measurements of a standing, inactive position. Dorman states that they found the energy cost of

Video games make grey matter loss in a brain structure and can cause serious damage, and harm to us if we continuously play. To begin, in the article “Playing action video games may be bad for your brain, study finds” it states, “After 90 hours of playing first-person shooter games the brain scans of response learners showed what West said is "statistically significant" grey matter loss in the hippocampus…’The problem is, the more they use the caudate nucleus, the less they use the hippocampus, and as a result the hippocampus loses cells,’” The Hippocampus is what controls our nerves/emotions and if we lose cells for that brain structure playing video games, it can be extremely harmful. In studies, people basically lose their mind. They

Most are unaware of the dangerous influence video games have on children and young adults today. Video game addiction is a serious and dangerous problem for our youth worldwide. This addiction has a negative effect on their mental and physical health and well-being. These effects include obsession, social isolation, and increased aggression and violence. There are also several health risks associated with gaming addiction such as seizures, obesity and even death. A 28-year-old man died from exhaustion in August 2005, after playing the game Starcraft for 50 hours straight (Young 1). “Statistics show that 80% of online gamers sacrificed at least one element of their lives, such as sleep, work, education and socializing with friends, family, and partners, to play video games” (Wei 1).

Children these days who are more focused on playing video games are at risk of having an unhealthy physical lifestyle. Video games play a part in a child’s health in that it could be the reason they do not get enough physical activity. This could lead to an unhealthy lifestyle in which they could become overweight and continue to be overweight as young adults. According to Melchior, Chollet, Fombonne, Surkan, and Dray-Spira’s research they stated “Young adults who reported playing video games once a week had a twofold likelihood of being overweight” (Melchior et al. 324). What they found out in their community sample of 674 young adults is that most of the young adults that play video games at least once a week had a bigger chance of

Since the time video games entered the entertainment industry, it becomes a necessary part of it and the most popular one. The video games sector is expanding and it covers a vast region. Every year the number of video game players increases and usually the players are from 8 to 18 years old. Despite the advantages that the computer and video games have, some people begin to realize the disadvantages of the video game. Video games can be considered as a time consumer since children and teenagers spend most of their time playing their favorite video games and the more they spend on video games the more it isolate the player from their families and friend. The consequences contain health effects whether on the brain that affects the behavior of the players, especially violent video games players, or other parts of the body. Video games danger of affecting people's lives has a set of