New Study, Same Results: Violence Is Bad

[Andy Chalk]

New Study, Same Results: Violence Is Bad

If it's Thursday it must be time for a new study, so here's one from a couple of university professors who say that playing violent videogames renders people indifferent to the pain and suffering of their fellow human beings.

Conducted by Professor Brad Bushman of the Iowa State University [http://www.umich.edu/], the study had 320 students play a videogame, either violent or non-violent, for roughly 20 minutes, after which they heard sounds of a staged fight that culminated with one of the combatants "groaning in pain" after ostensibly suffering a sprained ankle.

"People who had played a violent game took significantly longer to help the victim than those who played a nonviolent game - 73 seconds compared to 16 seconds," the professors noted. "People who had played a violent game were also less likely to notice and report the fight. And if they did report it, they judged it to be less serious than did those who had played a nonviolent game."

Similar results were reported in a separate study of people who watched a violent movie, who took a reported 26 percent longer to respond to a staged emergency outside the movie theater than subjects who had watched a non-violent movie. "The present studies clearly demonstrate that violent media exposure can reduce helping behavior in precisely the way predicted by major models of helping and desensitization theory," the study concluded. "People exposed to media violence become 'comfortably numb' to the pain and suffering of others and are consequently less helpful."

Fox News [http://www.gamepolitics.com/2009/02/19/study-violent-games-make-players-quotcomfortably-numbquot-suffering-others].

Comfortably Numb: Desensitizing Effects of Violent Media on Helping Others can be read in full here [http://sitemaker.umich.edu/brad.bushman/files/ba09.pdf]. (PDF format)



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[Aardvark]

After a lifetime of violent videogames, I still feel for one group of people's suffering. Cancer victims. Because there's no cure. There's still no cure. Periodically, we get a new report, compiled by very smart men, telling us how good/evil exposure to the youth's media preference of the day is, yet nobody has invented a sure fire pill that beats those rogue cells back into line.

The longer I live in a world where the greatest minds are dedicated to such banal, useless research, the more I hate my fellow man and enjoy his suffering.

 

[L.B. Jeffries]

It would be interesting if anyone bothered to research something besides violence and video games. The connection is always going to be tenuous at best because you still no way of knowing what's going on inside their heads while they play. Last time I checked, ANYONE who could not maintain the difference between fantasy and reality was a problem.

Why can't they study the potential teaching benefits? Memory retention? Therapeutic value?

 

[Drake the Dragonheart]

Aardvark, my sentiments exactly. Well not entirely exactly, there is also the people who die essentially because malaria treatment isn't as profitable as E.D. medication, or the people who wouldn't starve if their farmland wasn't being turned into desert or being embroiled in civil war where starvation is used against them.

Yes, why can't they research anything else? Why can't they put out a study about some benefits? Or a news article about an avid gamer helping to build a homeless shelter?

 

[nathan-dts]

I disagree with the videogames make people violent theory. People play these games as an escape from reality and a way to take their aggression out in a way that doesn't hurt anybody.

 

[shirin238]

Blimey, and here I was thinking/hoping that we were past this...
*sigh*
The second my space laser is complete I will be aiming at those idiots...

 

[Irridium]

how about instead of puoring millions of dollars worth of taxpayer money into these studies over and over, they put that money to reaserch cures for some of the world's worst diseases, like Cancer or AIDS.

 

[Avatar Roku]

...anyone think that maybe the people who played violent games were just better at realizing a fight was staged than anyone else? Of course not, that conclusion is both based on logic and puts violent games in a good light, so it can't be true.

 

[aplarsen]

Craig Anderson is on faculty at Iowa State University, not the University of Iowa.

 

[edgeofblade]

Sure, after watching a street racing movie, I want to drive faster. But does that mean there will be long term effects? Whatever effect they observe is temporary. Though I do have to hand it to them for a well executed study.

 

[Aardvark]

You do know the expenses involved in cancer research, correct? It's not anywhere as easy to sort out as you're appearing to claim.

Now, obviously, this is banal and useless research, but speaking frankly as a student of science, not everyone can be employed on the big issues.

Then fire these people and direct their grants into cancer research. Once we're disease free, can regrow/replace limbs and organs, have cured global warming and are well on our way to becoming an intergalactic species, then we can worry about pesky things like this.

 

[oneplus999]

...anyone think that maybe the people who played violent games were just better at realizing a fight was staged than anyone else? Of course not, that conclusion is both based on logic and puts violent games in a good light, so it can't be true.

Sorry but this is not a likely explanation. The reason is that the students would have been assigned randomly to groups "violent" and "nonviolent", they wouldn't get to chose or anything. So the only way they would be able to be "better at recognizing staged fights" would be if the game had actually made them better at recognizing fights, which is a much less likely explanation than that they were made less sensitive to violence.

I am, however, glad that they mention comparing gaming to other forms of entertainment. What I would really like to see is something that attempts to compare consuming violent media with traditionally accepted forms of aggressive behavior, like playing football.

And as to all of you "why don't they get back to solving cancer" guys, how stupid are you people? Do you say the same thing to your garbageman? After all, he's just moving trash around when his time would be better spent curing cancer! However, these are psychologists, and, as another commenter pointed out, we are already spending massive amounts of money on cancer research. It's definitely paying my way through grad school. You can't just get a grant for violence and media research then go decide you prefer doing cancer research, something completely outside of your field. I really don't know how to explain how bad of an idea it would be to have every single scientist in the world, qualified or not, working on the same problem. Its simply stupid.

By the way, are y'all suggesting that no one has ever died from insensitivity to violence? Have you never heard about the cases of murders in broad daylight where bystanders just watch, doing nothing? This is, in fact, a potentially life-or-death problem if a violent game makes you hesitate even a second in calling the police or stepping in in such a situation.

 

[Copter400]

After a lifetime of violent videogames, I still feel for one group of people's suffering. Cancer victims. Because there's no cure. There's still no cure. Periodically, we get a new report, compiled by very smart men, telling us how good/evil exposure to the youth's media preference of the day is, yet nobody has invented a sure fire pill that beats those rogue cells back into line.

The longer I live in a world where the greatest minds are dedicated to such banal, useless research, the more I hate my fellow man and enjoy his suffering.

This.
Again.

This.
Again and again.

 

[Durgiun]

Either this must be true or I'm a case for myself, since I rarely give a shit about anyone's suffering. Cripples, mentally retarded people, those born with defects etc. The funny thing is, I care more if a member of a different species is suffering than if one of my own is.

 

[Filtertip]

Sigh

 

[Aardvark]

It isn't just the costs either. The fact is that we only have a few ideas on where to begin, and they're hardly as useful as we'd like.

If it's not the cost, pay more people to look into it. If we devote enough minds to the subject, at least one of them will discover something worth investigating.

There's no absolute limit of people required to discover something. The more people thinking about a problem, the more likely it is that one will come up with a solution, or even the beginnings of one that can be expanded by another group.

Either way, more people being trained and looking into problems that actually affect the quality of people's lives, rather than those are used to score political points rather than affect positive change, the better off this world will be.