An update on the effects of playing violent video games

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• meh..... i dunno i just looked up this wierd place coz i need info for a school project :s i'm confused????????

• Dennis, LOL...using a flame-thrower and a chainsaw to get past some guards, that is a priceless image! Seriously, though, I checked out the abstract for this article and although the stereotypical view on video games is "video games = violence" there are positives to those views.
  Acting out violent behavior in a video game may provide a stress reliever, both physically and mentally, which impacts a player's behavior in the real world. Instead of blaming parents for incidents like the teenagers playing out Grand Theft Auto, they themselves should be at fault because they failed to distinguish fantasy from reality.
  However, like I said, there are behavioral positives resulting from video game playing. For example, when I was younger, I vented my frustrations into whatever game I was playing (these days it is the Final Fantasy series) and sometimes the console...which always got followed up by guilt because I knew breaking the machine meant no more gaming is possible. Essentially, video games and other events in my life, taught me how to control my emotions (including anger).
  I apologize for my long rant, but I believe the sooner we deconstruct the notion that "video games = violence," the sooner academic study of games becomes accepted by a general public.

• After skimming the article, I admit that I'm a bit confused as to what exactly qualifies as "violent". In the best proctices sections, it seems they exclude violence against other human characters. What does that leave? Is Mario smashing blocks violent?

• OK, I found a cached copy. You're right in that the word "causal" only appears in the abstract, not in the body of the paper, but methods section includes a response to each of the following objections to research on videogames and violence.

  The following potential methodological problems were examined for each sample:
  1.Non-violent video game condition contained violence, and there was no suitable non-violent
  control condition.
  2.Violent video game condition contained little or no violence.
  3.Evidence that the violent and non-violent conditions differed significantly in ways that could
  contaminate the conditions, such as the non-violent condition being more (or less) difficult,
  boring, or frustrating than the violent condition.
  4.A pre-post design was used, but only the average of the pre- and post-manipulation measures
  was reported.
  5.Each research session involved both a video game player and an observer, but only the average
  of the player-observer measures was reported.
  6.The aggressive behaviour measure was not aggression against another person (e.g.aggression
  against a non-human character, or against objects).
  7.The outcome variable was physiological arousal, but arousal differences between the violent
  and non-violent video game conditions were already controlled by pretesting and/or game
  selection (i.e. equally arousing violent and non-violent games were intentionally chosen by the
  researchers to control for potential arousal effects on other outcome measures such as
  aggressive behaviour).
  8.The outcome variable was aggressive affect, but affective differences between the violent and
  non-violent video game conditions were already controlled by pretesting and/or game selection
  (i.e. violent and non-violent games were intentionally chosen by the researchers to have the
  same affective impact, to control for potential affective influences on other outcome measures
  such as aggressive behaviour).
  9.In a correlational study, the measure of video game exposure was not specifically tied to violent
  video games (e.g. the amount of time spent on any kind of video game was measured instead of
  time spent on violent video games).

  The difference between association and causality is so basic to the scientific process that I'm sure that no academic study that made that mistake would pass the peer-review process. Journalists who make this mistake, and put causal claims into the mouths of researchers who only announced an association, are the ones largely responsible for the perception among gamers that the research being done in this field is shoddy. (The same goes for the headline writer who skews a whole story with an alarmist quote, or the person who writes the "Stay tuned for this upcoming story" blurbs.) In an editorial, the editors of the journal issue note, "Unfortunately, we did
  not receive a single submission reporting research on potential positive uses of video games."

  Will, I love playing computer games, too. My wife came around the corner once when I was using a chainsaw and a flame-thrower to get past some guards in Deux Ex, and she was horrified. I was surprised at her reaction... I don't like watching war movies, but she has no problem watching them... go figure.

  I'd love to see convincing evidence that violent videogames won't hurt my son, or at least that they won't hurt him any more than watching similar violence on TV. But for now he's perfectly happy with educational games and space combat sims, so I can afford to wait a bit.

• Will, the author of this article clearly identifies it as a survey. The same journal issue offers several other articles that provide original research.

  I just tried to visit the site again, and it looks like now the articles are behind a registration wall. Sorry about that... If I had known the issue would disappear like that I would have read it more carefully while I had the chance.

• Ok, I actually read this article you linked to now. But actually, it sounds to me like someone did a lazy "research" paper. They asked for other people to submit actual papers, and then summarized these other peoples papers. Maybe this is considered "legitimate" research - as that would be research. Anyways, I have a few points.
  The abstract specifically states that "An updated meta-analysis reveals that exposure to violent video games is significantly linked to increases in aggressive behaviour, aggressive cognition, aggressive affect, and cardiovascular arousal, and to decreases in helping behaviour. Experimental studies reveal this linkage to be causal."
  Curiously, in the actual article, there is no mention of the word causal! None at all! This is just another big, blown up headline meant to draw you in to read the article...an article which doesn't "technically" support the headline.
  Do you know what the article actually says? That there are "links" between video games and violence. Links! As anyone who does real research would tell you, links don't prove anything at all. They only help indicate areas that might have a casual effect. I bet there's a "link" between game playing and a reduction in skin cancer. Does playing video games reduce skin cancer? No - but it does mean you don't spend as much time outside in the sun, and sun exposure does have a causal link to skin cancer. It's very possibly much the same problem - video games are played by people who are either less social, or poor - and these two factors also are linked to an increase in violence. Like from this quote:
  "More importantly, in this large-scale correlational study these authors uncovered important links between violent video game exposure and a host of social and academic problems, including hostility, arguments with teachers, physical fighting, and poor school grades."
  Another legitimate possibility is that video games, because so many are violent, actually attract the more violent, less "achieving" people who need more immediate gratification. Did anyone do a study of whether Snood causes violent behavior? ;-)
  Finally, at least one of these studies suggests that playing video games leads to "more aggressive" behavior. You know what - getting an A on that paper or program also leads me to more aggressive behavior. And I mean more aggressive, not more violent. I'm more likely to work harder on my next paper. I'm more likely to ask the girl sitting next to me out on a date. "More aggressive" isn't the evil that it is implied. Seriously, after winning video games I enjoy, I am aggressive - towards whatever it is I want to do.
  Sheesh, I really have to stop writing these long comments and go back to searching for a job.