Yes, video games can cause aggression

[Sarah Frazier]

I absolutely loved to watch Power Rangers and VR Troopers as a kid, and guess what? I was one of the shyest people in school. I can count on one hand the times I was ever physically violent with anyone for any reason, and that reason was always self defense or preemptive self defense in one case. The only times I get wound up over something related to gaming is when I try to play a Street Fighter kind of game even though I have zero skill besides mashing buttons, but then you can say it's more frustration than aggression since I'm more likely to pass the controller to someone else and walk off rather than beat up the person who beat me.

So I guess that media (movies, TV, video games) can amplify aggressive feelings in people, but they aren't flashing messages telling people to go driving over people, shooting them, or putting a tire iron between their eyes. People with low impulse control with hyped-up friends may be more likely to act out what they'd seen on a screen, but notice how that can be attributed to lack of control and friends egging them on to do it.

Don't blame the entertainment media for people doing stupid thing. Blame the stupid people who let their friends talk them into being pushed in a shopping cart across a street at night. Blame alcohol and drugs while you're at it since those have been proved to get people to do stupid things. It's the news media that does a better job working otherwise sensible people to go into a panic because they've been told and shown that horrible things are happening that could directly affect their lives.

 

[Gunner 51]

Video games didn't make you violent, your pride did that.

Depending upon the game you play, if you're playing something like Black Ops or Tekken which require twitchy and adrenaline fueled reflexes and you lose at it - you're gonna rage. Mostly because you were unsporting and graceless at the time of playing.

Here's a life lesson for you: that the minute you stop having fun with a game - put it away and play something else. Because if you lose and get stressed, your stress will make you reckless and you'll make stupid mistakes and lose again and again - and get more stressed as a result.

Losing repeatedly may put you in a mad mood, but whether or not you decide to throw a punch is not the game's decision - but yours.

While I agree with you, I feel like that was aimed at me (must have been the "for you" part haha) which makes me laugh because I was about age 8 or 9 at the time. Of course its the person ultimately responsible for violence and not the game, but aggressive feelings can be caused by games (like most anything else) which is exactly what I was saying.

If I taunt the school bully and he hits me, he is responsible for the violence and his violent behavior, but I am the one who helped provoke it. Similar idea

Firstly, I'd like to apologise about the patronising tone of my post. I was condescending and I shouldn't have said it in the way I did.

I guess my life lesson could apply to anyone, while my opinion of "if it pisses you off - do not continue doing it" still stands. Certainly not a bad creed to live by, it's one I practice - especially in terms of Black Ops Multiplayer. When I get killed a bit too much for my liking, I wait get back to the lobby, I play something else. (Usually AvP because it's wonderfully cathartic to play as the Predator.)

I think you are right that anything stressful can bring aggressive thoughts to the fore. But the real challenge is controlling and channeling that aggression, and if one cannot control their aggression - they've got deeper problems than being a bit pants at video games.

 

[Torrasque]

Not "omg, I'm going to kill my parents for not letting me play Halo 3!" but certainly "WHAT THE FUCK MIKE. THUNDERBOLT SPAM IS NOT A STRATEGY. OH MY GOD" which happens every friday night...

 

[The Apothecarry]

If you're familiar with the Achievement Hunter series known as Rage Quit...then all I should have to say is four letters: Q.W.O.P.

These so called experts are right for all the wrong reasons. They treat game-induced aggression as a long-lasting psychological disorder, which in reality it isn't. When you've got a nut with a bunch of statistics running around shouting "Think of the children! Buy my stuff!" then anyone will listen.

 

[PureChaos]

this again? we know the theories, can people stop making this thread.

 

[Dracowrath]

Sometimes when playing violent video games I would notice myself becoming much more violent but only for a few minutes at a time. For example, when I attempted to beat InFamous on Hard mode, I remember fighting the last boss and feeling that adrenaline rush. I was in the zone, eyes wide, staring at the screen and reacting with perfect timing. Once I finished I felt like jumping up and punching something, anything. I wanted to fight. But a few minutes later when the credits were rolling, I was sitting calmly and trying to decide what to do next.

I think it was more the adrenaline rush if anything that caused it, at least for me. The fight or flight response kicks in and your body tenses up. But then once it's over, it takes a couple minutes for that to wear off. The games aren't making people more violent permanently, but during play and for a brief period afterward, you become more violent because your mind is in that violent state due to the fighting in the game.

 

[Dracowrath]

Aggression isn't caused entirely by parenting, it's a mix of that and biology. There's a segment of the brain in the front which keeps control over the more primal violent tendencies which, when damaged, can result in that person becoming more impulsive and aggressive. Video games may add to this but really, humans are violent even without video games.

 

[Agarth]

Okay. If video-games cause aggressive behavior than so does EVERYTHING ELSE IN THE UNIVERSE. Literally the ONLY time I've ever done something physically aggressive is when I'm fighting my brother, ('Cause bro do that) or if someone is threatening me. Neither of these were caused by video-games. It was caused by one of my friends playing with a BB gun when broke one of the windows of my house. If you fought with your friend because of a game you should learn self disipline. Hell, Total Biscuit from Cynicalbrit.com explained this way better than anyone I know ever could. It was on one of his 'mail bag' episodes on Youtube. Simply put, it's not games that make people pissy agressive shits, it's a lack of self control. When i'm not doing to well in TF2 I don't go out in the streets and beat a pedestian with a baseball bat. I take deep breaths, get a drink and try a different class.If I do badly in an RPG I lower the difficulty. In a RTS I try a new plan, ect. ect. And unlike most people on XBLA I don't swear and cry when I loose a game. It's self control at its most basic level is what it all boils down to. There is absolutely no proof what-so-ever that games are responsible for humanity's aggression. It's a fundamental quality of man, that an individual feels a strong urge to be the alpha above them all. And if you can't except that... Then get out of my world.

Besides. You probably repressed everything that I just said. I know how this world works.

 

[mjc0961]

*snip*

Your entire post says that video games do NOT cause aggression. You're trying to pass the blame on games or TV, but in the end it is YOU and your friend both wanting to win instead of having fun and it is YOU taking a game too far and hitting your sister. The game or the TV show didn't make you do any of those things, you being a little kid that didn't know how to properly handle himself did.

Hahaha I love how some of you are quick to point blame at me

Only because you're so quick to blame TV and video games for some instance of bad behavior in your childhood, so of course people are going to be quick to turn around and tell you that it's your fault.

If I taunt the school bully and he hits me, he is responsible for the violence and his violent behavior, but I am the one who helped provoke it. Similar idea

Poor comparison. Your example is you choosing to play a video game and blaming it when you get mad at your friend. And this is a bully having someone come up to him and purposefully piss him off. The video game neither purposefully tried to piss you off and it was your choice to play it, it didn't walk over out of nowhere and force you to play it. Whereas the bully is just minding his own business and then suddenly has some unwanted kid in his face taunting him, which is certainly a cause for aggression.

But no. Until video games start walking up to you and getting in your face making you play them, your comparison with taunting the school bully falls completely flat and makes no sense.

 

[Dracowrath]

I know what you mean, about the brother thing. The only times we ever actually came to blows was over other issues, completely unrelated to video games. Though the one big fight I got into in school was a result of a kickball game in gym class, when someone didn't get called out when he should have, I called him a name and a short while later I had a bloody nose.

 

[Jay Knowles]

you can point to as many examples as you like as to how video games cause violence, and i could point to just as many examples to the contrary. take myself for example, as a kid i had massive anger management problems, right up until my family got our first computer. the first video game i ever played for any length of time, was at age 13, it was carmageddon, if any of you are unfamiliar with it, it's basically gta on meth. almost instantly my violent tendency's stopped.

it might be true that violent people tend to gravitate to violent video games, it might even be true that they can cause violence, but it's just as likely that they can prevent it by giving a safe environment to vent.


tl;dr there is no right answer, games can cause or prevent violence depending on how you approach it.

 

[striderdaze]

This discussion is and will always be moot. Mostly, because the logic behind it has been disproven and largely debunked by the scientific community. In spite of that, people constantly have been using the same arguments for video games being a direct cause of violence. So I can't help but feel a little frustrated about how ignorant this thread sounds.

I'm sure it makes absolute sense: a person watches violence, hears about violence and participate in violence(well, sort of, in a video game), ergo he is violent. That is what sociologists and communications scholars call the Powerful Effects Theory or the hypodermic needle model.

The Theory contends that like a hypodermic needle that injects drugs directly into a blood stream, media content has a direct and immediate effect on consumers of the content.

The basis for this Theory is The War of the Worlds 1938 Radio Drama that was performed by Orson Welles. You can find easily find out the details of what happened on Wikipedia. But the short version of it is, he read War of the Worlds on radio, and people starting freaking out because theyactually believed that it was an actual news report and that aliens are really invading Earth (oh, those silly people in the 30s!).

But the Theory has since be debunked and replaced by other media theories. Research has shown that the media (in our case video games) are not as powerful as we think it to be. Our behavior may be influenced to some extent by the media, but we are more likely to influenced by our cultural and familial background, the friends and people whom we associate with, the kind of education we received, our life experiences, etc, etc.

So in short, video games are not the main cause of violence. Period.

 

[Raideh]

Cleaned.

 

[Omnific One]

Traffic causes aggression; should we ban/regulate roads and cars?

My point is anything can cause aggression, given the right circumstances. And adult aggression is far more dangerous than pre-adult aggression.

 

[IamQ]

Your examples are true, yet still vary from person to person. When I was playing video games and got mad, I never directed it towards someone, only the controller. Although I can't lie by saying that I've never wanted to punch that guy that killed me 387592075831074913750 times in a battle ground in WoW.

As for movies/TV-shows, that one I agree with 100%, because sounded alot like how I was back when I was a kid.

 

[Dalek Caan]

Of course they can, every time I play Black Ops I end up wanting to punch someone.

Sure but if is up to the person to control themselves. If they end up harming someone because of video games they shouldn't be allowed to play it.