A study undertaken by Lawrence Kutner, PhD, and his wife Cheryl K, has found that there is no evidence to prove the link which has always been drawn between voilence and video games. The research, which was funded with $1.5 mission US, has resulted in a book "Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games and What Parents can Do".
A long name, perhaps, but the research has slammed all previous assumptions that violent video games create violent people. The study surveyed 1,300 children in various states.
"If you look at violent crime in the U.S. over the past 20 years among teenagers, it's gone down and gone down significantly, and if you look at video game play, it's gone up significantly"
It is also claimed that other studies which DO draw a link between violence and video games "don't seem viable". Kutner also says that the differene which is often ignored is that of long-term vs. short-term aggression effects.
"If you go to the local Cineplex and see a Jackie Chan or Jet Li movie and you watch a bunch of teenagers come out of that, of course they're going to be sort of hitting each other and kicking; you know, they're excited. But that goes away very quickly. And so there's this leap of faith that if a child or teenager or even a young adult is exposed to this and they have a short term response, then that means it's going to change their behavior. We found it to be actually quite the opposite"
However, children who play nothing but M (and higher) rated video games, for 15 or more hours a week, do show greater risk signs of "getting into trouble". This is just a risk marker though, not a difinitive link. Despite this, boys who play no video games at all show an even higher risk. "It seems that playing video games for boys is a marker of social confidence. That surprised us."
"It's interesting if you look at what happened a year ago at Virgina Tech... [the attacker's] suitemates who he shared a dorm room with said that he didn't play video games at all and that struck them as really odd because everyone else did. And that fell right in line with our research findings, that the kids who don't play at all are actually at greater risk... It says something about their social relationships."
The study also comments on the forgetfullness that games are used to stimulate, and provide an environment in which kids can "explore new worlds and try new environments that are not critical of them, where they can make mistakes, recover, and practice for the real world."
Submitted by insectoid
21/04/2008
39
8
Join MyDS to vote for your favourite story!
Source URL:
http://www.gamedaily.com/articles/news/research-absolutley-no-evidence-violent-games-lead-kids-to-re