Individual personalities cause aggression not games
As an entertainment medium/art form, video games have been blamed for just about every societal ill under the sun. Politicians, lawyers, parental watch groups, soccer moms and supposedly “fair and balanced” news outlets have used games in the past as a scapegoat to explain such crimes as vandalism, theft, rape, and murder, as well as douchebag aspects like sexism and racism. But a new study conducted by the American Psychological Association proves the one thing that gamers (and anyone with an ounce of common sense) have already known for decades and that’s the fact that players (and the parent's who buy these games for their kids) need to take (or at the very least share) responsibility for their actions.
What does this study say exactly? Well in short, it says that prolonged exposure to video games is not the only cause of aggressive behaviour in rapid players. Their own individual personalities play a much more significant role. In fact, the games don’t share as much of the blame as some would have you believe.
Patrick Markey of Villanova University (the man responsible for the study) says that parent’s shouldn ‘t worry about their son’s or daughter’s video game turning them into a serial killer.
"But is your kid moody, impulsive, or are they unfriendly? It's probably not the best idea to have that child play violent video games."
During his study of 118 participants, Markey discovered that people who are highly neurotic and low on conscientiousness were the ones who were more prone to high levels of aggression after playing violent games.
It’s a shame that study’s like this have to exist in the first place, as they are a waste of money but if this is what it takes for people for video games to get fair treatment/coverage in the media, then I guess it must be done.
Seriously, if you are the kind of person who wants to commit an act of violence just because you saw it in a video game, you need to take a long hard look in the mirror. If you're a parent, for the love of everything, please pay attention to the ESRB ratings or least take look at the titles of the games you are buying for your kids. Grand Theft Auto doesn't exactly scream, "wholesome family fun" now does it?
» Source: http://www.gamepro.com/article/news/223002/research-study-the-player-not-the-game/
» Tagged In: #fox news, #PTC, #Ryan Conway, #study, #video games, #violence
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g1 DISCUSSIONS
Dallinag
This article reminds me of this: http://www.theonion.com/articles/scientists-trace-heat-wave-to-massive-s...
chainsawgrizzly
and it took you how long to figure this out?
TrueRandomness
The 'games and aggression' topic is beaten to death time and time again, but at this is one of those articles that makes sense as a posed to spewing out sensationalist crap.
FroggyXD
"Grand Theft Auto doesn't exactly scream, "wholesome family fun" now does it?" NO because some missions are hard as holycrabs.. (note: not a GTA gamer..)
Curry
I'm going to rape and kill each of the people who spam our discussion box because I saw it done in GTA and it seems like a good idea... No seriously.
OmegaMinion
.........No comment.....
winbzy
I thought that would be big news, but people won't go getting tired of making videogames a scapegoat to distract the real educational problem of the developed societies. Well, I'm also thinking of A Clockwork Orange and all the controvery around that movie. What people say about influential behaviours, enough saying this is an endless soap opera.
Smoofy
Yeah, pretty much, at this point I don't get why we bother posting the articles on the site, yes they are of use but all who are going to read it are gamers who know better. No parent is going to read this, although I hope the responsible ones have common sense, and all those politicians and new networks don't care. They're the ones who orchestrated this. Each time I have to read those articles and re-realise none of those idiots are going to learn I feel like I'm getting stabbed in the brain, repeatedly. What is so hard in reading a title and looking at a rating, you parents moaned for it because you were offensed at Sub-Zero ripping a head off but none can say ''Hey there's that ESRB stuff''.
winbzy
That's absolutely right, it doesn't worth it, people just don't care, they won't listen a damn thing, they go like sheeps meh meh! Oh, let's blame videogames, oh now let's blame the heavy metal, all of that because they can't handle their child's education. I know that is quite hard to educate a child, but I pretty sure that I won't blame videogames or whatever it is, as long we kept the parenthood responsabilities, example by seeing those rating content, if it isn't suitable for all audiences. Concluding and quoting a famous character who is a great example of an irresponsible parent: Boring!
Smoofy
You know what, of half the people who have child right now, half of them shoudn't have child. When you say someone shoudn't have children, I don't just mean abusive parents and the like, I mean idiots with unreasolved issues who don't realise the weight of their actions i.e:: right or wrong to a certain extent and just pass over their flawed experiences, in the context of how they understand it of course. I do realise human life is flawed but that doesn't you'Re supposed to get things the wrong way. Those are the kind of idiots who just push on idiots into our society, the ''everyone is a winner and gets a trophy'' kind of parent. The one who wants you to have the same zealous devotion to is kid. As George Carlin would say: ''No one cares about your children, that's why they're your kids!''
Well okay, we should be aware of them but we don't need to pull out the red carpet for them all the time. Yes, being a parent is hard, WELL YOU SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF THAT! You know, before doing it because everyone does it, or because your parents or church told you to do so. Yo have kids, take the responsability. Also, who is this fame character you're quoting?