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Devin Moore, 18, was a regular Grand Theft Auto player. In 2005, Moore was taken to a police station on suspicion of stealing a car, and once he was inside the station he shot three officers in the head and stole a police car to flee the scene. Moore's actions were similar to a scenario found in Grand Theft Auto.
A 60 Minutes report quotes Moore telling police "Life is like a video game. Everybody's got to die sometime." A child psychologist quoted in the article said that the violent video games Moore played contributed to his urge to commit a violent crime, in addition to his troubled upbringing.
In another situation, Warren Leblanc, 17, lured his friend to an isolated area and beat and stabbed him to death. Leblanc often played a video game called Manhunt where "a man roams the streets and kills anyone he comes across," according to The Telegraph.
Leblanc used similar weapons in his 2004 attack as those used in Manhunt and he confessed to the murder minutes later when he was found by police in bloody clothes. The victim's parents blame the game in part for inspiring Leblanc's violent actions.
In 2014, two 12-year-old girls went to the woods with their friend Payton Leutner, 12, and stabbed her 19 times as an offering to the online character Slender Man. An NBC report said the attackers believed so strongly in the fictional character that they were willing to kill their friend in order to "prove their dedication" to him.
Leutner survived the attack after she crawled to a path in the woods where passing cyclist found her.
Violent video games promote aggressive behaviors and attitudes and desensitize young gamers to aggression, especially those with other influencers.
Before the age of 20, most adolescents' brains are still developing and changing. Putting images of aggressive and violent actions into their heads influences that development.
One study suggests that adolescents who "already are high in certain factors, mainly hostility, are much more at risk to become aggressive due to influence by violent video games," than those who show low hostility. The correlation between violence, aggression and video games is complicated because there are many influencing outside factors.
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| Source: Google images |
Seeing violence regularly, even if it is in a fictional game, leads children to become desensitized to violence, a CNN story reported. One researcher said that "once you're emotionally numb to violence, it's much easier to engage in violence."
A lack of empathy and concern for others is also becoming apparent in adolescents who spend three or more hours per day playing violent games. BBC quotes a study where "violent" games were defined as "those where players acted out the killing, maiming, decapitating or mutilating of other human characters."
If teens are sitting in front of a screen for several hours each day, that means they are spending less time engaging in social situations, therefore not gaining a positive sense of right from wrong.
Aside from aggressive behavior, video games typically promote gender and racial stereotypes.
Male characters often dominate in video games. They portray the hero, the villain and the criminals, as well as the average guy. Women, however, are frequently the victim, the "damsel in distress" or the romantic interest of the game.
Male characters "appear more frequently, talk significantly more" and engage in more behaviors that show achievement and leadership, compared to female characters, as told in a Michigan State University study. When analyzing 130 games for various gaming platforms, they concluded 71% of the lead characters were male.
White characters are also found more often than black or other minority characters. When the minority characters do appear, they usually take on the role of the criminal or the secondary character, but rarely the main focus of the game.
One gamer discusses his or her observations in various games, citing Final Fantasy VII, where "the only black character...uses heavy weapons [and] speaks in broken English." Another game mentioned has only one possible "black romance option" and if the gamer pursues him, the character "cheats on you and gets another woman pregnant."
U.S. News found that gamers were more likely to act aggressively when they were playing a black character and pursuing a violent goal. The gamer volunteers who played as those characters "showed stronger explicit negative attitudes toward blacks," compared to players who used the white character.These virtual gender roles and racial portrayals perpetuate real-life stereotypes and set these thoughts into the developing minds of young gamers.
Video games have become more realistic and more graphic since they were first introduced as basic geometric games, like Pacman. The realistic violence and actions can have negative impacts on the evolving minds of teenage gamers, among other contributing factors.
More research needs to be conducted on the effects action-packed video games have on regular users and the correlation to real-life actions.
The thought that violent video games have led to murders and racial/gender stereotypes is a highly debated topic. After reading the ePortfolio I was saddened to hear about several different violent murders or attacks that were thought to have stemmed from what children “participated” in video games. The reason this topic is so debatable is because there always seem to be other outside factors other than video games that could have influenced a child to act so violently. Most of these children have had a very disturbing upbringing, or have trouble coping with emotions.
ReplyDeleteAs an avid video game player I find myself at times getting caught up in the games that I am playing. I must say that the video games I play are very violent, and I have never had violent thoughts about hurting another living thing. Maybe this is because I was brought up by wonderful parents and siblings, maybe it’s because I can cope with my feelings in other ways, maybe it has nothing to do with either. We may never truly get to the root of why people commit the crimes they do.
The ePortfolio states that adolescents brains are still developing and changing before the age of 20. By putting aggressive and violent actions into their heads, this influences the brain’s development in a negative way. There are so many outside factors that can influence violence, that it is hard to tell if there really is a correlation between aggressive video games and violence.
One study suggests that if we see violence on a regular basis we become desensitized to it and became emotionally numb to it. By becoming emotionally numb to violence it is much easier to engage in aggressive behavior. This is an interesting argument. We are all exposed to violence at some point, maybe not every day, or even once a month, if we’re lucky. However as we get older we learn to separate fiction from reality, and what is socially acceptable behavior. It is important to keep society in mind when dealing with violence. Some of us are exposed to the military, and others exposed to violence in our own homes. We each have different perceptions of what violence looks like; and we must keep that in mind when children are exposed to aggressive behavior.
Playing video games for several hours a day means that teens are spending more time alone in front of a screen rather than out in the world engaging in social situations. By limiting our time around others, we do not gain a sense of what is right from wrong, and we cannot learn to coexist with others, which could also lead to aggressive or negative behaviors.
It’s interesting that in most video games male characters are often the dominating character, and women are frequently the damsel in distress. It was also noted that white characters are found more than black or other minority characters. It’s a very large stereotype, but it was found that when the minority characters do appear, they are typically the criminal or secondary character. It really is a terrible thing to put these stereotypes at the fingertips of our developing younger society. Children spend so much time in the technology world that sometimes they do not know anything better. If they are seeing minorities in a negative way in the video game, that’s how their young developing minds interpret they will be in person; and in turn they may avoid any social situations with them. How does this help our society to integrate and be culturally diverse in a socially acceptable way?
With all of the negative impacts that video games can have on children, it seems most important to really monitor what children are playing, as well as the amount of time kids are spending in front of the television.