Video Game Violence

Video game violence has been a growing fear to many people such as parents, educators, child advocates, medical professionals, policy makers, and many others. This is a fear of tiny pixels being combined into something that will mold a mind into thinking things, or worse, doing things that have severe consequences. For some this is a very serious issue and can be a problem with many gamers.

Some organizations such as American Psychological Association, the American, Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Medical Association researched the affects of T.V. violence and concluded that a cause-effect relationship between television and aggression exhibited by children. So naturally, these organizations deduce that video game violence would have an even greater effect on young children. Four main reasons stand out:

1. Children are more likely to imitate the actions of a character with whom they identify. In violent video games, the player is often required to take the point of view of the shooter or perpetrator.

2. Video games by their very nature require active participation rather than passive observation.

3. Repetition increases learning. Video games involve a great deal of repetition. If the games are violent, then the effect is a behavioral rehearsal for violent activity.

4. Rewards increase learning and video games are based on a reward system.

I believe the violence in video games is an image of an “unreal” real world. Meaning, a world that resembles the real world where you can get in trouble for breaking the law and yet, being unreal, to be rewarded for breaking the same law (Grand Theft Auto). This image can be an example of what not to do. An example, if kids are shown at an appropriate age, which could help kids understand and would teach them that these violence things they are doing in the video game should never be done in the real world.

Although, you then get the crazy killer who blames the violence in the video games he or she has been playing on the criminal act committed. It is understandable if someone close to you has just been killed, then having that being blamed on video games, to also accuse the video game. When that happens, many people out side of the situation start to believe it was the video game violence, which could have been, but could have also been many other things.

Violence in video games is what makes some games what they are, “Mortal Combat” with moves like tea party or huge of flowers wouldn’t be a game. “Street Fighter”, “Tekken”, and shooters and roll playing games, almost all have violence. The level