The Impacts of Violent Video Games on the Youth - Research Proposal Example

24 July Introduction Psychologists and researchers increasingly agree that violent video games with profane language haveimmediate and long-term detrimental effects on the development of young children and adolescents. Modern video games that contain violence and profound language require the player to concentrate on the game rather than passively watch it, and it is possible that acting on violent speech can result to the reinforcement of violent thoughts, attitudes, and practices (Anderson, Buckley, and Gentile; Fink). At present, for the past ten decades, numerous studies showed correlations between violent video games and aggression (Gentile), poor social skills (Kutner and Olson), racism (Anderson, Buckley, and Gentile 8), and poor academic achievement (Bryant). Although the causative nature of violent video games is not yet widely accepted, several studies depict that the more time children spend in playing these games with crude language, the more verbally and physically aggressive they become (Anderson, Buckley, and Gentile; Fink). Bad language in violent media is a critical factor, because it can arouse negative thoughts and images, which can drive aggression (Fink). There could be a connection between listening to and speaking crude language, even if it is just “fantasy” or make-believe play for these games, and actually feeling and being more aggressive against others. These relationships between playing violent media and poor social and academic skills are not surprising, since the military has used violent video games to desensitize and to train soldiers to kill (Gentile). If the military can use violent media to prepare these soldiers for combat, it is not impossible for the same conditioning to happen for young children, whose moral, intellectual, and psychological stages are not prepared to understand the difference between “playing” and real-life aggression and violence. This is a proposal for a paper determining the impacts of violent video games on the youth, especially those kinds which contain profane language. Profane language pertains to cursing and treating other people verbally with disrespect. Topic Area The topic of this proposal is violent video games with crude language. These are games that some adults normally play for fun and recreation. These games are also commonly made for adult audiences. They are not supposed to be played by adolescents, especially by younger children. In reality, however, children and teenagers have easy access to these games. Their parents may not be aware of the ratings on these games and buy them for their children, or their children may be buying these games on their own. They may also be playing these games online for free. As video games progressively more dominate the market, many children find it “cool” and “entertaining” to play these games. They can find peers, who enjoy the same media, and play with them, sometimes for very long durations. The problem with this consumption of violent media is that this product is not designed for their age levels. It is highly possible that these violent media games have ill effects on the developmental abilities and other skills of children. Violent images, actions, and coarse language may be penetrating these young minds and rewiring how they see, consume, and act on violence. Positive reinforcement through rewarding violent behavior can lead to reinforcement of aggressive thoughts and actions. The effects of violent media may be worse for children at risk, such as delinquent youth and those coming from troubled childhood, or families, where violence is the norm. Thus, this is an important research area that deserves further attention, particularly in convincing parents and the youth alike that highly violent games with profane language are bad for society, because it conditions young players to accept aggression as a way of life. Research question The research questions focus on the negative impacts of violent video games with foul speech on the mental, social, and emotional conditions of young players. They also address the ways that parents and other stakeholders can control the consumption and distribution of these unhealthy games. The research questions posed for this research are: 1) Is there a difference in effects between violent video games with and without profane language and how do these differences shape the mental, social, and emotional development of young players? 2) What can adults do to help curb the use of violent video games with and without profane? Are there effective ways of reducing the demand for these games among the youth? 3) Whose responsibility is it to control the distribution of and access to violent media games? Parents? The government? The video games industry? Significance to Knowledge This research is significant to knowledge, because it will try to find more information if there is a difference in effects between the effects of violent video games and those with coarse language. It will help the youth realize that playing with these games will not be helpful for them. It will also help parents understand why they have to monitor and to control their children’s playing preferences. Parents have an obligation to educate their children about what is good and not good for them, and this includes the video games they play. Moreover, this paper aims to help reduce access to these games, especially for young players. It is concerned of how violent media games are reshaping the minds and actions of the youth, and so collective actions must be done to decrease and to control access to it. This includes marketing and distribution of violent video games online and other media channels. Literature Review Previous research Violent video games with profane language enhance risk factors aggression and tend to make young players more violent than those who are playing non-violent or educational games. Gentile, in his book, Media Violence and Children: A Complete Guide for Parents and Professionals, argues that for players of violent video games, rewards for violence increase participation in its violence, while repetition of these action-reward system increases learning of aggressive behavior (136). For instance, Rainbow Six, which has been used to train US Army soldiers, requires the player to keenly watch hostile enemies and remain aggressive (Gentile 136). The military knows that watching and playing violent games can desensitize people and remove their defense systems against seeing violence as bad for them. After all, in combat, their swift action to kill means life and death for them and the people they want to protect. In the book Violent Video Game Effects On Children and Adolescents: Theory, Research, and Public Policy, Anderson, Buckley, and Gentile reviewed several studies on violent games. They discovered that children are conditioned to violence, when they play these video games. Watching it enhances the effects of risk factors and results to negative effects, like verbal aggression and poor academic attainment. At risk youth includes troubled with youth with histories of violence and delinquency. Dowd, Singer, and Wilson, in their book, Handbook of Children, Culture and Violence, discussed experimental studies that have linked violence in video games to aggressive behaviors in teenagers. They provided research that revealed that watching violent games for delinquent children will reinforce aggressive attitudes. According to the book, the amount of play and content in the video game increase the likelihood of aggressive behavior formation (Dowd, Singer, and Wilson 235). Many delinquent children are already angry for different reasons and playing aggressive video games may only feed the need to act on their violent tendencies. Another well-known effect of watching violent video games is the development of bullying behaviors. Gentile explains the bystander effect, where children exposed to violence in video games become less sympathetic to the victims of violence. These are the bystanders of bullying, which enhance bullying behavior even more, because bullies like seeing that they are in control of other people. Another effect of playing these games is the appetite effect, whereby the player experienced increased urge to watch more violent video games, thus leading to aggressive behavior formation (Gentile). The frequency of playing these games makes them want more violence, which may translate in real life. Video games with explicit crude language and aggression can deter learning and lead to poor academic achievement. In the book, Playing Video Games: Motives, Responses and Consequences, Bryant shows how video games motivate children to participate in these fantasy worlds. Many players, he says, enjoys the immediate gratification from these violent acts. He also offers the positive effects of video games, such as increased visual attention and faster reflexes. However, he believes that numerous disadvantages are also present, such as aggression and poor academic attainment in children. Bryant underscores that when children are rewarded for aggression, they will soon learn that academics cannot provide the same instant pleasure. Paranoia may be a factor affecting academic development too. Gentile provides the victim effect, whereby people exposed to violence in video games develop fear and self-protective behavior like carrying knives and guns with them. If they are always on their toes, this might affect their concentration on their studies. They may be more predisposed in learning how to defend themselves, instead of learning their subjects in class. Aggression, due to playing violent video games, can be particularly disheartening, when it targets people in authority, racial minorities, and women. A number of violent video games attack the police, minority groups or other races (i.e. Chinese and Russians), and most especially, women. Some violent video games even rape women. Bryant notes the pleasure that some children get when killing cops, and if cops are symbols of authority, these games are training children to see people with right negatively and to act aggressively against them. Russell and Jarvis, in their book, Angles on Applied Psychology, examine how violence in video games have dominated the market and introduced other negative features like killing and destruction of the opponent or enemy in the game. For these researchers, these games push racism and sexism, since some encourage violence towards women and other racial groups. The book provides several longitudinal studies that have reported a positive correlation between violence in video games and juvenile delinquency. These studies stressed that violent video games alter the personality structure, making the player develop aggressive thoughts (Russell and Jarvis 151). These aggressive thoughts can be projected on other people, resulting to violence in actual life. Violent video games, especially those with profane language, can have long-term impact on children’s aggression levels. The book Stress of War, Conflict and Disaster by Fink studied the impacts of violent video games on children. Fink revealed that these negative effects are directly related to violence and can have negative long-term effects. The book gives an example of the Killing Fields and Terminator 2, which have highly aggressive messages. Fink mentioned risk factors that can make players more prone to developing sadism, such as situational factors that set off anger among players. The book offers cognitive priming theory, social learning theory and social scripts models of aggression formation in childhood and how the aggressive behavior is encoded in memory of the player. It asserts that profane language in the video games increases violent thoughts in children and teenagers (Fink 669).The book concludes that childhood aggression is highly correlated with childhood exposure in media violence. Saying and hearing profane language, while acting on violent actions through the games, can result to childhood aggression. Aggressive video games can develop poor social skills and habits among young players. The book Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games And What Parents Can Do, by Kutner and Olson examined the unfavorable effects of electronic violent video games on teens. They discovered that children playing violent video games experience social isolation and poor social skills development. Video games tend to be played for a long time, which detach players from the “real world.” They sacrifice time and energy that can be spent on forming face-to-face interactions. Kutner and Olson suggested that violence in video games can trigger real-world violence, thus children should be protected from violent games, like Grand Theft Auto, that are only good for adults. This paper proceeds to the ways that the access and use of these video games are curtailed, starting with regulation. Policymakers should enact laws that will limit children’s access to violent video games. Anderson, Buckley, and Gentile concluded in their book that alternative public policies should be implemented to limit the exposure of children and adolescents to violent video games, like rating the video games and controlling the duration of time children spend on playing the video games. Aboujaoude and Koran recommend stricter measures in their book, Impulse Control Disorders. This book provides various alternatives like control of the exposure of children to violence in video games through tighter regulation. Another initiative is educating parents on the adverse effects of violent video games and controlling the marketing of such games to young markets (Aboujaoude and Koran). Aboujaoude and Koran added that teenagers with high antisocial behaviors, anger and hostility should be prohibited from playing such games, in order to control the possible result of peer conflicts. The book concludes that violence in video games is a leading contributor to crime and violence in the streets (Aboujaoude and Koran 187). Dowd, Singer, and Wilson suggest less government intervention and more corporate initiative. They recommend voluntary rating by the industry players and spreading education about violent games’ negative effects. Parents have the primary responsibility of curbing access to and use of violent video games. Kutner and Olson recommended that parents should proactively control the video games played by their children and how children use the internet (260). The Internet already provides numerous violent media games that parents may not be aware of (Kutner and Olson 260). Aboujaoude and Koran add that parents should also educate their children and entertain questions regarding the negative effects of violent media on the latter’s development as human beings. Remaining Questions The remaining questions are: What else does society need to know and to do regarding this issue? And what are recent studies saying about violent video games with profane language? This paper believes that the gap in literature is providing a significant causal relationship between watching and playing violent games with crude language and how it affects how children think about and act on aggressive images and tendencies. There should be more research specifically on video games with profane language, since most research focused on violent video games per se. It will be useful to differentiate those that use profane speech and those games that do not, and if this difference has a significant mediating effect on the ill effects of aggressive video games. Methodology Approach The approach for this study is secondary research. This paper will focus on the following research questions and find original studies done, such as correlations or cause-and-effect studies. The research questions are: 1) Is there a difference in effects between violent video games with and without profane language and how do these differences shape the mental, social, and emotional development of young players? 2) What can adults do to help curb the use of violent video games with and without profane? Are there effective ways of reducing the demand for these games among the youth? Data needs The data will depend on primary research that other credible scholars have done. This will include review of literatures or systematic reviews; as long as they are current and help explain the difference between violent video games with and without profane language. The target samplings are children in their primary and secondary levels, or grade school to high school. Analytic techniques Analysis will be done through grounded framework, where emerging themes and findings will be determined from the research itself. At present, there is bias in showing that violent media games are bad for the youth in general. This bias will be lessened through using and analyzing studies that show that violent media games do not have negative effects on the social, mental, and emotional development of young players. These sources will be evaluated for their credibility and the validity of their research design, analysis, findings, and conclusions. Works Cited Aboujaoude, Elias, and Lorrin Koran,. Impulse Control Disorders. Cambridge: Cambridge U P, 2009. Print. Anderson, Craig, Buckley, Katherine, and Douglas Gentile. Violent Video Game Effects on Children and Adolescents: Theory, Research, and Public Policy. Oxford: Oxford U P, 2007. Print. Bryant, Jennings. Playing Video Games: Motives, Responses and Consequences. New York: Routledge, 2006. Print. Dowd, Nancy, Singer, Dorothy, and Robin.Wilson. Handbook of Children, Culture and Violence. Los Angeles, CA: Thousand Oaks, 2006. Print. Fink, George. Stress of War, Conflict and Disaster. Boston: Academic Press, 2010. Print. Gentile, Douglas. Media Violence and Children: A Complete Guide for Parents and Professionals. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003. Print. Kutner, Lawrence, and Cheryl Olson. Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth about Violent Video Games and What Parents Can Do. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2008. New York: Russell, Julia, and Matt Jarvis. Angles on Applied Psychology. Cheltenham: Nelson Thomes Ltd., 2003. New York: Read More