Video game culture and its effects on children's brains

Video Games and Violence in Children

The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines a video game as an electronic game that is played on a video screen and often emphasizes fast action ("Video games"). Computer games are also referred to as video games and according to the encyclopedia Britannica, it is any game which is interactive that is operated by computer circuitry. The machines on which electric games are played include general purpose shared and personal computers, arcade consoles, video consoles that are connected to television sets and handheld game machines. Video game as a term represents the totality of these formats or more specifically those games played on devices that have video displays like television or arcade consoles.

Video game culture

Video game culture is a form of media culture that is new and its influence comes from video games. Video game culture came about after the digital revolution of the last decade changed the film branche rapidly. According to the Media Analysis Laboratory of Simon Fraser University, the first video game, "Space Wars," took PDP1 computer that was room sized and was worth millions of dollars and was located at the basement of the MIT and was created by Steve Russell. This invention showed the possibility of computers as a tool for fun and has, since then, had a profound impact on children's culture in the contemporary society. Russell applied the same cybernetic principles of 'interactivity' that was at the time associated with office technology and automation, to children's entertainment and therefore creating, out of the TV screen, a medium that was entirely new. Over three decades after the invention of the video game, video gaming has become the fastest growing of children's cultural industry and also the most profitable (the Media Analysis Laboratory).

According to Browning, the video game phenomenon's cultural effects are greater than its economic effects. Video games have been blamed for causing everything from suicide to school shootings, like in Littleton, Colorado in 2006. This has caused video games to be taken more seriously giving good and bad results. Good results have included higher game quality games that do not rely on shooting and racing alone and there have also been limits on what children of a certain age can access and buy (2).

Video games have changed a lot and evolved overtime with the introduction of the internet. Video and computer games have influenced all aspects of modern life. Video games are played in a variety of ways socially involving domestic gatherings or even publicly. This can be accomplished through the use of Local Area Network that enables family and friends to create a social event for friendly competition amongst them.

The study of brain with games

Scientists have found that computer games stimulate only those parts of the brain that are devoted to vision and movement and do not aid the development of other important areas of the brain (Wearden). There has been concern about children who spend many hours playing games not developing their frontal lobes that are important for the control of behavior and the development of memory, emotion and learning. This is discouraging as the new generations of children play computer games that are different from those in the past. This affects the children in negatively as the society we live in generally grows more violent. Students are doing bad things as they play games and they are refraining from activities that stimulate them intellectually like reading and learning arithmetic. Scientist found that it is important for children to practice basic mathematics, reading and writing so as to boost the frontal lobe development (Wearden). The development of the frontal lobe is important as it enables one to control their behavior. These were results obtained from a study that was carried out on hundreds of students playing a Nintendo game and was compared to other students who were practicing basic arithmetic. According to Wearden, the results showed that there was a lot more brain activity that was needed to solve arithmetic tasks than the one used to play video games and there was a great difference in the activity in the frontal lobe.

How video games influence children

According to Norcia, video games have been available to people for the last 30 years and are a unique form of entertainment as they encourage players to become a part of the game's script. Video games have become more sophisticated with time and require players to pay attention constantly to the game rather than doing so passively while they do something else like watching television. This has brought about positive and negative impacts on those who play the games specifically the children (Anderson and Dill 779). A common positive impact that is used with reference to video games is that it helps the player, in this case the children, may improve their manual dexterity and computer literacy. With technology always improving and changing, players are able to learn the use of better graphics which give a playing experience which is more realistic. This quality of the video games makes the industry a powerful force in many lives of the adolescents who use them (Norcia).

The General Aggression Model

This is a model that attempts to explain both the development of aggression an individual differences in susceptibility to the influence of video games that are violent, (Kooijmans). This model operates on the theory that both situational and person logical variables interact to affect a person's internal state that comprises of cognition or thoughts, affects or feelings and arousal or physical. These aspects influence each other and they all affect a person's interpretation of an act that is aggressive. Once the brain completes its interpretation, a process for making decisions starts taking place. This model states that violent video games have long-term and short-term effects on the users. Short-term effects have been observed while the long-term effects are just hypothetical (King, Delfabbro and Griffiths 103). The short-term effects include situational variable, causing an increase in aggressive cognitions, affects and arousal. The study on the long-term effects of video games are hypothetical as the research that is being carried out is ultimately new. Hypothesized effects of violent video games include promoting aggressive beliefs and attitudes thus creating an aggressive schema, aggressive behavioral scripts and aggressive expectations.

The formulation of this model shows how complicated an issue the relationship between violence, video games and aggression. Those who are high on factors like hostility are much more at risk to become more aggressive as a result of the influence of violent video games. People who have low hostility have been shown to have no change in their aggression levels when they are influenced by playing video games that are violent (Funk et al. 241). The formulation of the GAM helps greatly in understanding the complex relationship between aggression and violent games. The amounts of biological and physical changes that occur during puberty can affect the processes that occur within the GAM. The processes, which are already in place at adolescence, are usually at this time still influenced by their current environment. Adolescence is usually a stage that is characterized with an increase in aggression and this aggression combined with exposure to violent media reinforces and increases aggressive cognition, affects and arousal. This has a negative effect on the internal environment of the individual which leads to increased aggression, (Kooijmans). This exposure and at the stage of adolescence the individual is in determines the level of aggression they express. This means, the exposure at early adolescence exhibits higher levels of aggression as compared to the exposure during mid and late adolescence.

Intellectual ability and scholastic ability

According to Sakamoto, video games have many features that are attractive to children and can stimulate educational performance that is improved in learners as well as children (Sakamoto 2). Traits that can stimulate improvement in educational performance include attractiveness, motivation, active engagement, challenges, data handling capabilities and enabling learning by doing. If these characteristics were added to ordinary classroom teaching, students would be more enthusiastic to study. By introducing games to classes, learning would be made more effective. Conventional classes do not offer challenging, vivid and complex features as the circumstances and content that is offered in video games. On top of this, video games offer educational attributes like the functions for enhancing self-feedback, personalization and learning that are collaborative (Sakamoto, 2).

Videogames, according to Sakamoto, have various instructional functions that promote educational performance in learners. Some games show models for living and as a result they have a modeling function to the models who may imitate the behavior that is shown in the model. The games have attractive visualizing functions for complex phenomena. Performances in the game can be objectively observed and thus Meta cognition in learners can be observed. They offer intellectual and affective knowledge of results that correspond to the behavior of the learners. This is important in that it offers a kind of reward to reinforcement of appropriate behavioral components. With the rehearsal components of the games, repetition helps in the achievement of educational and training goals (Sakamoto 2). Due to video games having many aspects of educational functions, they should be able to achieve and enhance various kinds of abilities and competences such as skills, planning, creativity, problem solving, strategic thinking, knowledge, communication abilities, negotiation abilities and group decision making abilities (Sakamoto 3).

Friendship with others

With video gamers considered as "loners" for the longest time as is usually the case in any American medium, the Multi-User Dungeons have revolutionized the gaming industry. The MUDs online text based online environments where users can collaborate in groups so as to enable them to complete quests, solve puzzles or even slay villains (Squire 5). An example of such a game is Avatar whose difficulty and variables are manipulated so as to force gamers to collaborate quickly with fellow players and create bonds which will sustain their online gaming community. Characters are each given unique strengths and weaknesses and no character can survive without collaborating with other players. Avatar and games like it design challenges that foster community building which they can do from experience (Squire7).

The Future of Video Games

Kooijmans stated that with the majority of research focusing on the negative impact of video games, there was need for more research to be done so as to prove that video games do have a negative impact on the users especially in relation to violent content. This need to prove the exact impact that video games have on the players and those around them, has brought with it a hypothesis about the positive impact of video games. Therapy is one of the areas that have been seen to come out of using video games. With a majority of video games being violent in nature there have been emerging games that take on the intellectual point. Puzzle games like Tetris are thought to stimulate the mind by presenting challenges and puzzles to the player as opposed to enemies and worlds. Many play these games to keep their minds alert and active. This has in turn brought the idea that these games can be used as a therapy form. This is because, some of these games are relaxing and soothing and they can specifically altered to meet a patient's needs, as an individual, (Kooijmans). Video games can be used, for instance, to help a patient connect certain memory cells in their brains or help in the general stimulation of the brain.

The other area that video games have been believed to be helpful is in eye-hand coordination. When it comes to playing modern video games, one needs to have sufficient skill. A player is expected to do a lot so as to ensure that they win as there are usually a lot of things going on at once. A character that a player is playing may be required to be doing a lot of actions where they are running and shooting at the same time, for instance. One is required to keep track of the character's position, where they are headed, their speed, where their weapon is pointed and where exactly their weapon is supposed to injure or destroy their enemy. These factors need to be taken into account and the player is required to coordinate their brain's interpretation and the reaction with their hand and fingertip movements. A great deal of eye and hand coordination as well as visual-spatial ability is required in order to be successful. An increase in video game playing has been closely associated with improvement in eye hand coordination as well as manual dexterity and reaction time, (Ballard and Weist 729).

Video games are just mere simulations, basically, interactive multimedia that is used to try to simulate some phenomenon in the real world, (Kooijmans). Due to their close relationships, research that is used in the research of video games could be applied to simulations. Flight simulators are the most known simulations that attempt to mimic the actual real situation of flying a plane. All controls like airspeed, wing angles, altimeter, among other instruments are displayed for the player and also included are visual representations of the world which are updated to the real time. Simulations have been used by large corporations to train and make their employees better. With promise of a wider range of uses, the United States government released a game called 'America's Army' that simulates the experience of real time war. This simulation is hoped to be used in the training of the next generation of army recruits (Kooijmans).

Opposite view paragraphs

Sandstrom says that a new research at the University of Zaragoza in Spain showed that every hour spent by teenagers on virtual play poses a threat of them becoming overweight and obese. This however does not apply to games where the player mimics the actions involved in sports. The University of Hong Kong believes that the energy used is similar to that one would use when taking a brisk walk (2009). Another view is that hours spent on repeated movements could damage tendons and the nerves in the thumbs. Slouching is also causing harm to the spines causing alarm amongst physiotherapists. This is because children play these games while sitting on the floor or on their games or even in chairs that are too big for them. Video games are also seen to pose a threat of causing addiction amongst their users. This is due to video games not having an end to them and therefore has a potential for endless play (Anderson and Dill 782).

Arguments that support the use of video games include, video games involve multi-person play with players either in the same room or connected to each other online. In this way, games allow children and adolescents to build relationships with their peers, (Sandstrom 2). Video games are also given praise for giving the player an eye for detail. According to a research done by the University of Rochester, people who spent 30 hours training on action games over a month were able to sport targets on a screen that was cluttered 80% of the time while non-gamers were able to do so 30% of the time. An insurance agency in the U.S. called Allstate were carrying out trials on video games for drivers who are older as it has been found that game software can improve visual skills important for safe driving, (Sandstrom 3). Video games are also considered as a fast track to a sharper mind. A group of laparoscopic surgeons were studied by researchers from Iowa State University and it was found that those who played 3 to 4 hours of video games per week were 27% faster and made 37% fewer errors. These games were not specifically designed for them rather they were any games that they could get their hands on. Video games are also proving to be powerful pain killers or analgesics. Virtual reality games are unusually attention grabbing which leaves little attention paid to the process of incoming pain signals. There is a video game that is specifically designed to cater to burn patients called 'Snow World'. Patients playing the game while having their dressings changed reported a 40-50% pain reduction.

Conclusion

In conclusion, violence arising from exposure to violent video games is usually rare. I believe that for one to actually partake in such violence there must be some underlying psychological issues that would make them decide to do so. Games are usually played so as to help in reducing stress and should not be looked at as a way whereby psychopaths and serial killers or mass murderers are created. More research is required so as to come up with the real connection between violence and how violent video games influence them.