If parents monitored their kids and raised them right this wouldn't even be a theory.
I've played all gtas and all cods, I've never got a ridiculous urge to go and cause terror or whatever because I'm not fcking mental.

It all comes down to the person playing it, I remember when parents would get mad if their kid played CoD because they would think shooting people is a normal thing when in reality they just play for fun and wont actually shoot people, take me for instance, I love violent games with shooting etc but i'd never do anything that they do in games

I actually wrote a 1500 word research paper about this for my composition class lol. I'll sum it up briefly.

People are quick to blame video games as a direct cause for violent tendencies. Recognizing the negative influence violent video games could have on the youth, the ESRB was established so that parents are made aware of the violent content in the industry. With that awareness, parents can determine if their child is mature enough to handle playing a violent video game. A fighting game should not be blamed when a child gets in trouble for punching another at school; the child was likely not mature enough to even be playing. In addition, studies have also shown that the total number of violent crimes committed has declined as video game sales rose. Also, crime rates have shown declines in the following weeks of a Triple-A video game release. Finally, the mainstream media creates a bias against video games in order to generate a hot-topic, or to distract the public from more serious issues. Factors like gun control and the mental health of a perpetrator should also receive attention in a mass shooting investigation. Also, video games do not train people to become mass murderers as they cannot perfectly replicate complex skills such as shooting a gun. Although video games may contain extremely graphic content, they are not a direct cause of violence.

Some articles worth checking out (I referenced these in my actual essay):
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I'm posting what I posted on the last topic about this, with some added nuances:

There have been a lot of cases where someone has committed a crime and part of their motive has been because they were playing a violent video game shortly beforehand.

There needs to be a line drawn between increasing aggression generally and causing a person to commit a crime.
There is a big difference between hitting your brother too hard after he beats you at a game and performing an act of pre-meditated murder after playing a game.

Thought needs to also be directed towards what levels of violence are acceptable in regards to people playing games and becoming violent. If the level is set at one person who plays a widespread game hitting another person as a result of playing that game then all violent books, films, music videos, and TV shows would also need to be banned.

I also think that people need to be much more tentative and humble in how they use what the general consensus of psychologists is and how they incorporate that into their own beliefs.
When it comes to children and what drives them to do things psychologists know very little.
Don't take my word for it, renowned psychologist Paul Bloom has said that he won't even raise his children using the things he knows about child psychology because it is such a difficult subject to place anything as factual.

If we do say that video games cause violent behaviour then it would have to be a certain type of video game and the line can't be drawn simply at 'violent.'

Let's compare three violent games, the first of which would - in this hypothetical scenario - increase a person's proclivity towards violent behaviour.

GTA V

A game where violence is glossed over by witty quips and encouraged in many of the missions. The ragdoll physics seem to be in place partly for realism, but there is an obvious humour factor to seeing a fake person cartwheel through the air after being hit by a car.
Any character in this game who doesn't like or can't stand violence is viewed as a **** by the rest of the characters and the three main characters all come from violent backgrounds. Almost every aspect of this game is violent. If people were to begin talking about banning violent games this would undoubtedly be the first game on the list to go.

Let's take another violent video game which would also have to be considered if talks about banning games were to begin and a game which I think they would, or should, have a much harder time trying to decide on.

Spec Ops: The Line

Anyone who has played this game will probably already know the point I am about to make. Violence in this game goes horribly wrong and the player is given a very brutal look at just how destructive violence can be.
This kind of exposure to violence is probably one of the best ways to ensure that the player becomes a better and less violent person.
I would argue that it has the same effect on someone's sense of justice and strength of their ethical principles as watching a police procedural.

So in this hypothetical world where violence in video games is linked to violence in real life, would they decide to ban this game too?
A game which shoves the violence right into the players face and screams, "LOOK HOW BAD I AM!"

What about a game which is very much in the grey-area?

Gears of War

In this game you fight for the future of humanity and to save lives, it is a very ethically positive mission that the game puts you on, but you are able to accomplish this in extremely violent and sometimes funny ways. When you chainsaw an enemy in half the main character basically cheers at the violence.
Would they say that this game is encouraging violent behaviour?
Or would they say that this game is teaching that all human life is precious and should be saved at any cost?

Those who do believe that video games cause violent behaviour do not take into account the types of violence and the motivations behind violence in some video games and this nuance needs to be made clear to them otherwise this debate can go nowhere meaningful.

There is some good discussion to read on this thread. However, we must not get caught up too much on violent games and violent crimes. There are other responses and factors to take into account for sure. For instance (and as is put in the survey) it must be considered how far virtual reality games can effect non-violent actions like theft or swearing.

Also, there's a lot of discussion about video games in general, which is fine, but little is mentioned about virtual reality games and the supposed increased immersion that ensues.

Do you think the increased immersion will effect aggression and criminal responses?

Ahab wrote I'm posting what I posted on the last topic about this, with some added nuances:

There have been a lot of cases where someone has committed a crime and part of their motive has been because they were playing a violent video game shortly beforehand.

[...]

Those who do believe that video games cause violent behaviour do not take into account the types of violence and the motivations behind violence in some video games and this nuance needs to be made clear to them otherwise this debate can go nowhere meaningful.

I understand the post, and thanks! However, what about virtual reality and non-violent (but still negative) responses to VR gaming?

Also, what about adults being influenced by gaming?

I have deliberately separated out aggressive and criminal actions in the survey, and put a few specific actons in, partly to make sure that there is no assumption that by "crime" I mean "violent crime".

I like your thinking though. However, for games that don't exactly have a supposed "purpose" behind the violence (I could name a few), do you think these kinda of games can effect aggression and crime?

Don't get me wrong, I'm a gamer myself, I just find this topic and people's opinions on it incredibly interesting.

3PT wrote I actually wrote a 1500 word research paper about this for my composition class lol. I'll sum it up briefly.

Thanks for posting that summary! Just wondering though, what about virtual reality and non-violent (buy still negative) responses. Also, I know that your summary was based mainly on children playing games, but what about adults?

For instance (and this is an extreme example) Norwegian terrorist Breivik admitted to using video games as training for target acquisition with guns.

Obviously the game did not cause his violence, but surely training the violence is just as bad.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a gamer myself, I just find this topic very interesting

tombehere wrote

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Ahab wrote I'm posting what I posted on the last topic about this, with some added nuances:

There have been a lot of cases where someone has committed a crime and part of their motive has been because they were playing a violent video game shortly beforehand.

There needs to be a line drawn between increasing aggression generally and causing a person to commit a crime.
There is a big difference between hitting your brother too hard after he beats you at a game and performing an act of pre-meditated murder after playing a game.

Thought needs to also be directed towards what levels of violence are acceptable in regards to people playing games and becoming violent. If the level is set at one person who plays a widespread game hitting another person as a result of playing that game then all violent books, films, music videos, and TV shows would also need to be banned.

I also think that people need to be much more tentative and humble in how they use what the general consensus of psychologists is and how they incorporate that into their own beliefs.
When it comes to children and what drives them to do things psychologists know very little.
Don't take my word for it, renowned psychologist Paul Bloom has said that he won't even raise his children using the things he knows about child psychology because it is such a difficult subject to place anything as factual.

If we do say that video games cause violent behaviour then it would have to be a certain type of video game and the line can't be drawn simply at 'violent.'

Let's compare three violent games, the first of which would - in this hypothetical scenario - increase a person's proclivity towards violent behaviour.

GTA V

A game where violence is glossed over by witty quips and encouraged in many of the missions. The ragdoll physics seem to be in place partly for realism, but there is an obvious humour factor to seeing a fake person cartwheel through the air after being hit by a car.
Any character in this game who doesn't like or can't stand violence is viewed as a **** by the rest of the characters and the three main characters all come from violent backgrounds. Almost every aspect of this game is violent. If people were to begin talking about banning violent games this would undoubtedly be the first game on the list to go.

Let's take another violent video game which would also have to be considered if talks about banning games were to begin and a game which I think they would, or should, have a much harder time trying to decide on.

Spec Ops: The Line

Anyone who has played this game will probably already know the point I am about to make. Violence in this game goes horribly wrong and the player is given a very brutal look at just how destructive violence can be.
This kind of exposure to violence is probably one of the best ways to ensure that the player becomes a better and less violent person.
I would argue that it has the same effect on someone's sense of justice and strength of their ethical principles as watching a police procedural.

So in this hypothetical world where violence in video games is linked to violence in real life, would they decide to ban this game too?
A game which shoves the violence right into the players face and screams, "LOOK HOW BAD I AM!"

What about a game which is very much in the grey-area?

Gears of War

In this game you fight for the future of humanity and to save lives, it is a very ethically positive mission that the game puts you on, but you are able to accomplish this in extremely violent and sometimes funny ways. When you chainsaw an enemy in half the main character basically cheers at the violence.
Would they say that this game is encouraging violent behaviour?
Or would they say that this game is teaching that all human life is precious and should be saved at any cost?

Those who do believe that video games cause violent behaviour do not take into account the types of violence and the motivations behind violence in some video games and this nuance needs to be made clear to them otherwise this debate can go nowhere meaningful.

I understand the post, however what about virtual reality and non-violent (but still negative) responses to VR gaming?

I'm hesitant to put any kind of opinion down on this because there simply hasn't been enough study on VR.

Swearing could be seen as a common side effect of gaming. You will hear people say anecdotally that their child began swearing when they started playing violent video games, but given that this would usually be around the teenage years anyway that correlation doesn't equal causation in my opinion.
With adults gaming could be the cause, but I simply don't know.

VR is more realistic but I don't think it's so realistic that it would have much more of an effect on violent and anti-social behaviour than regular video games.
The amount of people affected negatively would rise but it wouldn't be a rise by an order of magnitude which would be that noticeable or worrying.

But that's just my general feeling around it and not based on anything other than what I have witnessed with people gaming.

Never really thought about this but I suppose if you're playing a VR game and lets say you lash out, like a reaction and hit some then yeah i guess so.
However, can it increases aggression while you're on the streets or not playing the VR game, then I highly doubt it.

Ahab wrote

I'm hesitant to put any kind of opinion down on this because there simply hasn't been enough study on VR.

VR is more realistic but I don't think it's so realistic that it would have much more of an effect on violent and anti-social behaviour than regular video games.
The amount of people affected negatively would rise but it wouldn't be a rise by an order of magnitude which would be that noticeable or worrying.

But that's just my general feeling around it and not based on anything other than what I have witnessed with people gaming.

Agreed, there is very little research on this. This is why I have chosen to do some research of my own.

There has, though, been some very interesting research into "immerse controllers" and emotive responses - which did find a correlation between increased immersion and emotive response.

So, hypothetically you believe the increased immersion could increase negative response, but only by an insignificant amount? On the flip side, do you think more people would be positively effected by games that have underlying positive messages?

Or would most positive messages be missed amongst most violent games?