“That’s not how you do it, you have
to insert the lexicon into the crystal pedestal!” My 5 year old cousin
announces, while playing online with some of his friends from school. These
kinds of phrases can be heard regularly, while I am trying to get him to watch
some cartoons on TV, or to stay still so I can read a book to him. My eager entreaties
fall on deaf ears. He stops talking to his friends on the computer, and turns
to me and says in an annoyed voice, “Why would I want read a book or watch TV,
when I could be playing with my friends on the computer?” He then turns back
around in his chair and continues to try to solve all of the ancient Aztec
puzzles, so he can get out of the mystical jungle. As much as I wished (for my
sake more than his) that he would get off the computer and stop playing the
game, I couldn’t say that I blamed him, not in the least. When I was younger I
loved to watch my dad play on our Nintendo 64. I could literally sit by him for
a whole day, staring at the TV and not feel at all bored. There was just
something so mesmerizing about the whole thing, and whenever I got the chance,
I would sneak the console out of the living room and hook it up to my TV. I spent
many hours as a child playing racing games and stumbling through Mario 64,
though I didn’t know what I was doing most of the time. A good part of the
memories I have below the age of seven, involve video games in one form or
another, in fact many kids have similar memories and have grown up playing
them. So if video games have become such a big part of our culture, especially
to those born now or in the last 20 years, can they really be called the cause
for the supposed increases of violence observed in youth? Are video games the
sole culprit? I would propose that they are not, and that there are many factors
that go into making a person prone to violence.
There are many concerns pertaining
to the effect that video games could have on the minds of youth. Some experts
believe that they could lead to addiction, increasingly violent behavior in
children, expectations for violence or immunities to violence, and the loss of
social skills. Addiction, as it turns out is actually kind of a big issue. In
fact the Chinese government imposed penalties on gamers who “spent more than
three hours playing a game by reducing the abilities of their characters.” A
lot of the big online game operators ended up adopting the same system, to help
“combat addiction in a country where more than 20 million…play regularly.” And
there was actually a case where “a player killed a fellow player who had stolen
his virtual sword.” There are many cases in which compulsive video game playing
has had negative effects, like in the instance of a high-school student from
Ontario, Canada. He said that the sword-and-sorcery game Ever Quest ruined his
life because he “went for a week without bathing or eating a proper meal and
stopped going to school for a semester.” Likewise, a 30 year old nurse who
played the same game with her husband said, “We spend hours-hours! - Every
single day playing this damn game. My fingers wake me, aching, in the middle of
the night. I have headaches from the countless hours I spend staring at the
screen. I hate this game, but I can’t stop playing. Quitting smoking was never
this hard.” Of the players who play online multiplayer games, about 40 percent
“consider themselves addicted.” South Korea, which is considered the epicenter
of online gaming, “launched a game addiction hotline, and hundreds of hospitals
and private clinics treat the addiction.” Besides South Korea, there are also
video game addiction clinics in the Netherlands, and internet addict
psychologists in the U.S. But despite all of these treatment centers, some
prominent addiction experts say “even those who play games excessively rarely
meet all the characteristics of addiction - such as developing physical withdrawal
symptoms like sweating…needing to play more and more to get the same kick and
being preoccupied to the point of it is destructive to one’s livelihood and
family.” Then there is the concern for
increases of violent behavior. In certain video games, violence makes up the whole
or basic focus of the game, and these are the kinds of games that people are
worrying about. The American Psychological Association recommended that all
violence be reduced in video games marketed to children and youth, because
there was research “indicating that exposure to video-game violence increases
youths’ aggressive thoughts and behavior and feelings.” Young children often imitate what they see,
so being exposed to violence in video games could encourage them to act out.
Elizabeth Carll, a New York psychologist, said, “Playing video games involves
practice, repetition and being rewarded for numerous acts of violence, which
may intensify the learning.” Mark Griffiths, a psychologist at Nottingham Trent
University in Nottingham, England, shares a similar opinion. “I’ve concluded
the younger the person, the more likely there is to be an effect. If children
watch or play video games, right afterwards they will mimic what they see on
the screen.” (Glazer “Video Games”) Video games could also result in someone
becoming immune to violent acts, which then lead to actually performing them in
the real world. Gloria DeGaetano and Kathleen Bander, writers of the book
Screen Smarts: A Family Guide to Media Literacy, said that, “When children
watch numerous traumatic shows on television and spend a good deal of time
playing violent video games they may come to require increasingly horrific
programming to feel an emotional response. And, in time, even the most violent
of screen images will have less of an effect, possibly leading one to seek
violent ‘thrills‘ in the real world.” There was a case in England, where
“14-year-old Stefan Pakeerah was savagely murdered” by a friend. The parents of
the victim claimed that “the murderer had been obsessed by the violent computer
game ‘Manhunt’” which awards points for savage killings. The killer was 17 year
old Warren Leblanc, who plead guilty in 2005 to the murder. Stefan’s parents
“blamed the game,” and asked retailers to stop selling it. Instances like this
are the basis for the strongest arguments against violence in video games. But
besides the violence itself, games are also getting a bad rep for making
players unsocial and unable to cope with social situations in the real world.
“Critics worry that [gaming is] making kids more socially isolated, less
experienced in working with others and less creative.” (Glazer “Video Games”)
This brings to the mind the stereotype of the 30 or 40 year old living in the
darkness of his parent’s basement, who doesn’t talk to anybody. A person
without social skills certainly would have a hard time living in today’s
society, and video games could contribute to that. In summary, there are many
questions about the moral values that violent video games portray. “What we are
saying is that as children watch thousands of violent acts or play intense
video games, their attention is taken away from the consequences of real human
suffering. These images serve to distort ideas about pain and death. And, in
the case of video games, violent images are connected with feelings of
exhilaration, accomplishment, and conquest. They offer not a means of coming to
terms with violence and human nature but a reinforcement of violence as a way
of life.” (De Gaetano, “Media Literacy”)
All of the above
mentioned negative aspects of violent games are certainly valid arguments, but
what of the games that aren’t violent? Can they be used to help aid in the
learning processes? Some academic scholars claim playing games is good for
literacy, problem-solving, learning to test hypotheses and researching
information from a variety of sources.
It might actually surprise some people to know that there are many
educational aspects to games in general, for instance, take a game like Madden
NFL. Though it might seem like a mindless button masher, to win it, a player
has to use an encyclopedia sized play book, and have “a sophisticated
understanding of strategy and make split-second decisions about which play to
choose.” This forces people to take the knowledge they have and make good
choices in stressful situations, which according to University of Wisconsin
Professor of Reading, James Gee, is “pretty crucial in the modern world.” In fact, the Federation of American
Scientists pushed the government to invest in research and development of
educational games for K-12 students and for adult work force training, stating,
“Many video games require players to master skills in demand by today’s
employers.” Another aspect as to why
games promote learning is the “trial and error” philosophy that is incorporated
in most games. If a player makes a mistake, that doesn’t automatically spell
disaster because they have the ability to start over, and try again. Kid aren’t
afraid to fail, and going from past experiences, I think that’s what really
encourages learning. “In a good video game, players are encouraged to take
risks, explore, and try new things, because the price of failure is not
terribly high...failure in games is seen by players as crucial to learning.” (Drotner,
“Media and Culture) Dmitri Williams, an assistant speech communication
professor at the University of Illinois agrees, “A kid in a classroom has to
worry about looking like an idiot. In a game, they’re raising their hand all
the time, and true learning comes from failing.” Video games can also act as simulators that
can be used to solve problems in the real world. Games like Sim City prove that
children can readily understand things that might be at first considered too
difficult for them to understand. Science writer Steven Johnson, who wrote the
book Everything Bad is Good for You, said that he spent an hour teaching his
nephew to play Sim City, and was trying to figure out how to save a dying
industrial neighborhood, when the 7 year old “piped up [and said] ‘I think we
need to lower industrial tax rates.’” James Paul Gee, who wrote an article in
the book The International Handbook of Children, Media and Culture, said,
“Civilization III and other games [have] shown that even young learners can enter
a game as a complex system and learn deep conceptual principles about history
and the social sciences.” Then there’s the argument that kids who play video
games don’t use their leisure time productively, as in reading books or
studying. But according to a survey done by the Kaiser Family Foundation,
“heavy gamers-more than an hour a day - actually spend more time reading for
pleasure (55 minutes daily) than teens who play no video games at all (41
minutes).” As to the addicting quality of games, most experts say that it’s
really hard to classify someone as truly addicted, because most players don’t
meet the strict definition of “addicted,” which includes withdrawal symptoms
and intense single minded preoccupation. “There’s hardly anyone I would class
as a genuine video-game addict,” says Professor of Gambling Studies Mark
Griffiths of Nottingham University. The biggest argument against the addiction theory
is that there are very few people who say they are addicted, and meet all of
the criteria for being “addicted.” As far as literacy goes, games actually have
been shown to help in that particular area of learning. Games like Civilization
include things like, ruling societies and building cities, trading natural
resources and waging war, in the game play. One game of Civilization takes
about 20 hours to finish, but if you want to build a master society, it could
take you 100 hours or more. To play the game you have to figure out the types
of governments, and how factors like natural resources help a civilization
survive or fail. It’s really a complex game, and kids who played and attained
master levels, learned and retained a lot. “We found when they’re expert
gamers, they (8-13 year olds) can tell you the differences between
civilizations, what technologies they would need, what resources they’d need,”
said Kurt Squire, an assistant professor of educational communications and
technology. The American Federation of Scientists says that students remember
almost 90 percent if they are actively involved in what they are learning,
compared to about the 10 percent remembered from something they read. This is
why some teachers and experts say that video games are very useful in teaching
because “... the mind works rather like a video game.” James Paul Gee says
“...human understanding is not primarily a matter of storing general concepts
in the head or applying abstract rules to experience. Rather, humans think and
understand best when they can imagine (simulate) an experience in such a way
that the simulation prepares them for actions they need and want to take in
order to accomplish their goals.” Video games also promote creative thinking,
and Katie Salen, a desiger at The New York School for Design, says “Gamers not
only follow the rules but push against them, testing the limits of the system
in often unique and powerful ways.” Some people are questioning the morals in
games though, that could contribute to excessive violence in youth. Criminologist
Lawrence Sherman of the University of Pennsylvania says, “Just as violent video
games were pouring into American homes on the crest of the personal computer
wave, juvenile violence began to plummet.” Many experts say that there are just
too many other factors that go into making a person violent; video games aren’t
the sole problem. And to the violence itself, I don’t think that it is such a
big influence as to whether people buy games, as some would believe. “Critics
of games need to realize that players, especially strategic and mature players,
are often focussing on game play more than they are on content per se.”
(Drotner, “Media and Culture) The game Pong has a pretty simple, almost boring
concept (hitting a white circle back in forth with rectangles on a black
background), but it turned out to be pretty successful, which I think proves
the “playability vs. content” theory. Playing games doesn’t always mean being
anti-social. Multiplayer games like World of WorldCraft, City of Heroes, Second
Life and There.com are social games that, in some instances, can help people
develop better social skills. “ Players...orient to each other not in terms of
their real-world race, class, culture, or gender...but through their identities
as game players.” (Drotner, “Media and Culture) Players online can connect to
people all over the world and have conversations with them, whereas most social
interactions in a person’s daily life don’t involve talking to somebody in
other countries about strategy, or how to best accomplish something. James Paul
Gee says, “...what is really important about today’s massive multiplayer games,
like World of WarCraft, Lineage, EverQuest, City of Heroes, and Guild Wars, is
the ways in which, sometimes for better and sometimes for worse, people are
creating new ways to build and share knowledge. They are also forming new forms
of learning communities. We have much to learn from these games about new ways
to organize learning socially in tomorrow’s classrooms, libraries, workplaces,
and communities.”
The overall
argument is that there is not enough concrete scientific evidence to tie
increased violence in adolescents, to the playing of violent video games.
Violent images are everywhere, so I don’t believe video games by themselves are
enough to trigger violence in people. I think there has to be other
contributing factors that push people over the edge to perform the actions that
they do, “...while humans react emotionally to images in much the way they do
to real life, this does not mean they are tempted to act on these emotions in
real life: people do, after all, have higher thought processes in terms of
which they make decisions and decide what is and is not real.” (Drotner, “Media
and Culture) And yes there are positive aspects of games, though by themselves
they are good, but not sufficient. Some kind of teacher or mentor is still
needed to encourage thought processes. They aren’t the same as real-life, but
that’s the point. When one plays video games, it’s okay to make mistakes
because in “real-life” they are of no actual consequence which allows for more
trial and error, and I believe, more learning. A person could learn just as
much from a video game as in a book. A book could just as easily contain
“useless” information as a video game; the content is what matters.
Kids are smart.
They know right from wrong in a general sense, because they are constantly
learning it, if not from their family members, then from their friends and
teachers. Yes, it’s a simple fact that children will inevitably imitate what
they see, but it’s up to the adults to instill in them an understanding of
their actions. And I would say that violence isn’t really a huge factor as to
why people play video games, I think it’s more about actually playing them.
When I play games, and somebody gets stabbed or a character dies, my first
though is usually not “awesome, that was so cool!” It falls somewhere in the
lines of “gross, why’d that happen?” Or I don’t think of it all. I try to
immerse myself in the story of the game, instead of focusing on the negative
aspects. Games (the good ones anyways) are like movies and books in that sense.
I feel bad when something sad happens, and rejoice in the good things, but I
never take anything for absolute truth, unless I know for sure that the content
is factual. In conclusion, video games are big part of our culture now, and I
think it’s up to us the make the best of them.
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