Psychology Study Blames Games for Aggressive Behavior

[RuralGamer]

Personally, I don't think violent video games make people aggressive; I think frustrating games (i.e. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Veteran) make people aggressive, just like trying to drive in rush hour or being stuck behind an old lady at the shops who takes five minutes to count her money (I've actually served someone who did that), but you don't see someone people try to propose those from being banned because its just silly.
From experience, I am generally aggressive after a really frustrating round of BFBC2 full of spawn-rape and horrendously powerful clans who don't give you a chance to move from the spawn than dismembering mutants for a couple of hours of Fallout: New Vegas. In fact, I believe that the latter is a good stress release and allows me to get on with life during difficult times without becoming frustrated enough to end up venting it out at someone who doesn't deserve it.
I'll use Yahtzee's argument from the Mortal Kombat review which is; Do violent video games truly make little kids think that its OK to know each other's heads off or fire fireballs at them? That's not to say that I don't think there are some games out there that are messed up, but until I see someone without an agenda conducts a truly unbiased experiment and use a reasonable test group, I'm just going to ignore both sides; besides video games are big business and I highly doubt that these naysayers will be able to get anything significant done without a fight or some sort of backlash, either from the consumers or the companies.

 

[Carlston]

Ok. I call it like I see it.

THIS IS LAZY SCIENCE.

Everyone has blamed TV, cartoons, Elvis,rock n roll, the beattles and videogames for violence/down fall of society...depending what's new on the menu.

It has no basis, no merit, to easily skewed but whom is giving the grant money.

You put on a fake study, show your funder what they want, collect money.

It's like the lame never ending fox/cnn stories of

Cheese burgers make you fat, Try this instead!

A plagiarized cut and pasted story/study just regurgitated because the author/lead researcher can't think of anything real, so just throws it out there to show they are pretending to work...

I tend to only get aggressive when people skirt out on their own personal responsibility. GTA didn't make you steal a car, pac-man didn't turn you into a binge eater... you did that yourself not the games.

 

[soulfire130]

I'm going to call B.S. on this study. 1. Desensitization does not mean a person will be more violet, they are just not act so disturbed by seeing violence.

Unfortunatly, I forgot my other points I was going to make. Curse my crappy memoery. *sigh*
(-_-)

 

[Strazdas]

Maybe these scientists were one of those people with brain disorder who could not differentiate real violence and computer/movie violence.

 

[kinggamecat]

Wow will these psychologists just GIVE IT UP! Work on something more important for fox news to exploit.

 

[FalloutJack]

People of the world, I bring you news that you can use!

Namely, we've been through this before, time and time again. You will never make the link that games equal violence! Games equal therapy AGAINST violent action through simulation. They make you feel better, which is why they are a form of entertainment. In other words, to say that any game has MADE violence happen is entirely backwards in thinking and WRONG.

 

[I.N.producer]

I was working on a series of papers on this same subject for a semester of my English class, and while reading a lot of these studies, you see the same methods for testing showing up in every study.

I think it's shocking to see the same methods recycled to reinforce the same point, partly because I've seen studies that show that the methods researchers are using are unreliable, unproven, and only theoretically indicative of anything.

Plus these researchers also apply laboratory results directly to real-life situations, assuming that the situations are the same. Try playing video games alone and with people studying you. It will definitely be a very different experience.

In addition, all of these studies are done on people who have not committed an act of violence. Therefore, the studies don't include a real link to violence, just a theoretical one.

 

[DevilWolf47]

Until their research the correlation of desensitization and violent behavior was never proven. After their research, IT STILL WASN'T PROVEN. Okay, video games may cause hearing impairment. Come back when you've got a better test structure and a better test of aggressive behavior, and when you've got a broader test group than Call of Duty fans. To say this was lazy is like saying dark space is cold.

 

[Nexus4]

Given the kind of world we live in, I do not think a desensitization to violence is necessarily a bad thing. As he said it does not cause violent behavior, but in my opinion it merely keeps people from being shocked or mentally scarred from violent images; which is not necessarily a negative trait this day and age.

 

[James Joseph Emerald]

This is fucking stupid! Agh! I'm going to find that psychologist and RIP his FUCKING head off and shit DOWN HIS NECK!

Fuck I'm pissed now! I'm gonna go watch My Little Pony. Friendship all up in that ************!

 

[Olrod]

He needs to repeat the experiment with violent movies and TV shows, and graphically violent comic books.

 

[Frotality]

so fake violence desensitizes people to fake violence and loud noises desensitizes people to loud noises....next you'll be telling me seeing in the dark desensitizes people to darkness (which it does).

this seemed to be based in a logical fallacy of sorts... this just shows that humans adapt to things they are familiar with; TECHNICALLY you could say video games increase aggression, in the same way that sports do because your actively engaging in an aggressive activity. as a matter of fact, merely watching sports has produced far more violent behaviour than videogames. you could substitute a number of factors in this study and come up with similar results.

how about you pinch someone's arm, then pinch another guy who you kicked in the balls; the second subject will likely be desensitized to pinching.

 

[Jakub324]

I play violent video games all the time, and I blame them for my highly active imagination and my yet uncompleted novel! Yes, the desensitise us, but does that mean we all want to go out and shoot Ruskies? OF COURSE NOT!!!!

 

[Rofl-Mayo]

Really, I wasn't expecting them to do something like that. /sarcasm

Of course they would.

"We don't have any new studies but let's make up some bullshit and say we've noticed something."

 

[Jegsimmons]

OR.....maby that bullshit...

i don't no...does anyone else think that people tend to make the psychology reports up sometimes?

 

[DolorousEdd]

Violence is often caused by frustration. Frustration is most commonly and most strongly evoked in "social" (or not so) contexts. Without a serious disorder, people can usually keep themselves sufficiently in check. Violence by itself is not attractive to a sane mind and cannot "convert" someone to it.
That are just some common sense observations.

 

[Shenonymous]

"Basically we as gamers have to concede that yes, violent games DO desensitize people to violence and encourage people to be more aggressive."

For those who deny it, deny it all you want, the research data shows that violent video games affect immature children's behavior, if not adults who have learned better the difference between reality and fantasy. This is not to say that violent video game are not to be sold, how about just not sold to children, and curbing their involvement in simulated war and all its gory?