Assignment 2: LASA 1—Analytical Summaries

Shooting in the Dark Carey, Benedict . New York Times , Late Edition (East Coast); New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]12 Feb 2013:

D.1.

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ABSTRACT  

Playing the games can and does stir hostile urges and mildly aggressive behavior in the short term. [...]youngsters

who develop a gaming habit can become slightly more aggressive -- as measured by clashes with peers, for

instance -- at least over a period of a year or two. FULL TEXT  

The young men who opened fire at Columbine High School, at the movie theater in Aurora, Colo., and in other

massacres had this in common: they were video gamers who seemed to be acting out some dark digital fantasy. It

was as if all that exposure to computerized violence gave them the idea to go on a rampage -- or at least fueled

their urges.

But did it really?

Social scientists have been studying and debating the effects of media violence on behavior since the 1950s, and

video games in particular since the 1980s. The issue is especially relevant today, because the games are more

realistic and bloodier than ever, and because most American boys play them at some point. Girls play at lower

rates and are significantly less likely to play violent games.

A burst of new research has begun to clarify what can and cannot be said about the effects of violent gaming.

Playing the games can and does stir hostile urges and mildly aggressive behavior in the short term. Moreover,

youngsters who develop a gaming habit can become slightly more aggressive -- as measured by clashes with

peers, for instance -- at least over a period of a year or two.

Yet it is not at all clear whether, over longer periods, such a habit increases the likelihood that a person will commit

a violent crime, like murder, rape, or assault, much less a Newtown-like massacre. (Such calculated rampages are

too rare to study in any rigorous way, researchers agree.)

"I don't know that a psychological study can ever answer that question definitively," said Michael R. Ward, an

economist at the University of Texas, Arlington. "We are left to glean what we can from the data and research on

video game use that we have."

The research falls into three categories: short-term laboratory experiments; longer-term studies, often based in

schools; and correlation studies -- between playing time and aggression, for instance, or between video game sales

and trends in violent crime.

Lab experiments confirm what any gamer knows in his gut: playing games like "Call of Duty," "Killzone 3" or

"Battlefield 3" stirs the blood. In one recent study, Christopher Barlett, a psychologist at Iowa State University, led a

research team that had 47 undergraduates play "Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance" for 15 minutes. Afterward, the

team took various measures of arousal, both physical and psychological. It also tested whether the students

would behave more aggressively, by having them dole out hot sauce to a fellow student who, they were told, did

not like spicy food but had to swallow the sauce.

Sure enough, compared with a group who had played a nonviolent video game, those who had been engaged in

"Mortal Kombat" were more aggressive across the board. They gave their fellow students significantly bigger

portions of the hot sauce.

Many similar studies have found the same thing: A dose of violent gaming makes people act a little more rudely

than they would otherwise, at least for a few minutes after playing.

It is far harder to determine whether cumulative exposure leads to real-world hostility over the long term. Some

studies in schools have found that over time digital warriors get into increasing numbers of scrapes with peers --

fights in the schoolyard, for example. In a report published last summer, psychologists at Brock University in

Ontario found that longer periods of violent video game playing among high school students predicted a slightly

higher number of such incidents over time.

"None of these extreme acts, like a school shooting, occurs because of only one risk factor; there are many factors,

including feeling socially isolated, being bullied, and so on," said Craig A. Anderson, a psychologist at Iowa State

University. "But if you look at the literature, I think it's clear that violent media is one factor; it's not the largest

factor, but it's also not the smallest."

Most researchers in the field agree with Dr. Anderson, but not all of them. Some studies done in schools or

elsewhere have found that it is aggressive children who are the most likely to be drawn to violent video games in

the first place; they are self-selected to be in more schoolyard conflicts. And some studies are not able to control

for outside factors, like family situation or mood problems.

"This is a pool of research that, so far, has not been very well done," said Christopher J. Ferguson, associate

professor of psychology and criminal justice at Texas A&M International University and a critic of the field whose

own research has found no link. "I look at it and I can't say what it means."

Neither Dr. Ferguson, nor others interviewed in this article, receive money from the gaming industry.

Many psychologists argue that violent video games "socialize" children over time, prompting them to imitate the

behavior of the game's characters, the cartoonish machismo, the hair-trigger rage, the dismissive brutality.

Children also imitate flesh and blood people in their lives, of course -- parents, friends, teachers, siblings -- and one

question that researchers have not yet answered is when, exactly, a habit is so consuming that its influence

trumps the socializing effects of other major figures in a child's life.

That is, what constitutes a bad habit? In surveys about 80 percent of high school-age boys say they play video

games, most of which are thought to be violent, and perhaps a third to a half of those players have had a habit of

10 hours a week or more.

The proliferation of violent video games has not coincided with spikes in youth violent crime. The number of

violent youth offenders fell by more than half between 1994 and 2010, to 224 per 100,000 population, according to

government statistics, while video game sales have more than doubled since 1996.

In a working paper now available online, Dr. Ward and two colleagues examined week-by-week sales data for

violent video games, across a wide range of communities. Violence rates are seasonal, generally higher in summer

than in winter; so are video game sales, which peak during the holidays. The researchers controlled for those

trends and analyzed crime rates in the month or so after surges in sales, in communities with a high

concentrations of young people, like college towns.

"We found that higher rates of violent video game sales related to a decrease in crimes, and especially violent

crimes," said Dr. Ward, whose co-authors were A. Scott Cunningham of Baylor University and Benjamin

Engelstätter of the Center for European Economic Research in Mannheim, Germany.

No one knows for sure what these findings mean. It may be that playing video games for hours every day keeps

people off the streets who would otherwise be getting into trouble. It could be that the games provide "an outlet"

that satisfies violent urges in some players -- a theory that many psychologists dismiss but that many players

believe.

Or the two trends may be entirely unrelated.

"At the very least, parents should be aware of what's in the games their kids are playing," Dr. Anderson said, "and

think of it from a socialization point of view: what kind of values, behavioral skills, and social scripts is the child

learning?"

Photograph

Craig A. Anderson, Director of the Center for the Study of Violence at Iowa State, Believes Violence in Media Is Only

One Factor in Mass Shootings. (Photograph by Mark Kegans for the New York Times) (D6) Drawing (Drawing by

Jimmy Turrell) DETAILS

Subject: Studies; Social research; Students; Computer &video games; Violence; American

culture

Company / organization: Name: Iowa State University; NAICS: 611310; Name: University of Texas; NAICS:

611310

Publication title: New York Times, Late Edition (East Coast); New York, N.Y.

Pages: D.1

Publication year: 2013

Publication date: Feb 12, 2013

Section: D

Publisher: New York Times Company

Place of publication: New York, N.Y.

Country of publication: United States

Publication subject: General Interest Periodicals--United States

ISSN: 03624331

CODEN: NYTIAO

Source type: Newspapers

Language of publication: English

Document type: Feature

ProQuest document ID: 1285624142

Document URL: https://login.libproxy.edmc.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/128

5624142?accountid=34899

Copyright: Copyright New York Times Company Feb 12, 2013

Last updated: 2013-02-27

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