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Most players play these games to pass the time, increase hand eye coordination, and create harmless competitions amongst those playing. However, some who play these games are entranced by the violent aggressive behaviors demonstrated in the games and may even act out behaviors learned from playing them. Is the correlation between violent video games and violent aggressive behavior demonstrated by those who play these games a coincidence or do these games actually enhance these antisocial behaviors? On April 20, 1999, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold launched an assault on Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, murdering 13 and wounding 23 before turning the guns on themselves. Although it is impossible to know exactly what caused these teens to attack their own classmates and teachers, a number of factors probably were involved. One possible factor is violent video games. Harris and Klebold enjoyed playing the bloody, shoot-‘em-up video game Doom, a game licensed by the U.S. military to train soldiers to effectively kill. The Simon Wiesenthal Center, which tracks internet hate groups, found in its archives a copy of Harris’ web site with a version of Doom that he had customized. In his version there are two shooters, each with extra weapons and unlimited ammunition, and the other people in the game cannot fight back. For a class project, Harris and Klebold made a videotape that was similar to their customized version of Doom. In the video, Harris and Klebold dress in trench coats, carry guns, and kill school athletes. They acted out their videotaped performance in real life less than a year later. An investigator associated with the Wiesenthal Center said Harris and Klebold were “playing out their game in God mode”(Pooley, 1999). Cesarone stated in the results of his study in 1993, “video games have a direct effect on people’s behaviors. Violent video games, games with fighting, killing, or intentional harming of a game character, are most likely to have an effect on someone’s behavior. Mostly young adolescent males and college males play violent video games. At one time, video games were thought to have a positive effect on children” (Cesarone, 1993). This assumption does not hold true in today’s time with the high graphic content of today’s games. The fantasy violence present in today’s games is more realistic than ever, characters punch, kick, shoot, and mutilate each other in every way imaginable. Very few games are liked by adolescent and college males that do not involve violence in some way. Positive correlations are yielded between video game playing and aggression (Fling et al., 1992). For many people, video game playing might be a useful way of coping with pent-up and aggressive energies (Emes, 1997). For others though, the constant playing of violent games causes individuals to become more aggressive and more violent. Video game playing over a short period of time temporarily causes the person to become more aggressive. Playing video games over a long period of time causes the person to not only become more aggressive but, also more violent (Anderson & Dill, 2000). The types of person most affected by video games are adolescents and young men usually in college (Funk 1993). Video game playing not only increases aggressive behavior and violence, it also decreases college academic grades (Anderson & Dill, 2000). Since males were more prone to playing video games, its not surprising that among five categories of games, the two most preferred categories were games that involved fantasy violence, these games were preferred by almost 32% of male students surveyed. These games were followed in popularity by sports games, some of which included violent subthemes, which were preferred by more than 29% of those surveyed. Nearly 17% expressed a preference for games that favored human violence. Less than 2% of the students surveyed preferred games with educational content (Cesarone, 1993). In a study of college males and aggression it was determined that an increase of heart rate and blood pressure occurred when playing a violent video game with human characters compared to playing a game of pool (Ballard & Rose, 1995). Two different violent video games were used in this study. One was Mortal Kombat 1, MK1, the other was Mortal Kombat 2, MK2. MK2 is the more violent and bloody game. When the experiment participants were tested, it was determined that those who played billiards had a lower heart rate and blood pressure compared to those who played MK1. Those who played MK1 had a lower heart rate and blood pressure compared to those who played MK2. Hostility measures were also conducted and those playing MK2 had the highest scores followed by those who played MK1, followed by those who play billiards (Ballard & Rose, 1995). In two studies conducted by Anderson and Dill, Study 1, found that real-life violent video game playing was positively related to aggressive behavior and delinquency. The second study found that laboratory exposure to graphically violent video games increased aggressive thoughts and behavior. In both of these studies men had a more hostile view than that of women. The findings from these studies are consistent to that of the General Affective Aggression Model, GAAM, which predicts that exposure to violent video games will increase aggressive behavior in both the short term (example, laboratory aggression) and over the long term (example, delinquency) (Anderson & Dill, 2000). Video games are one of many sources of violent entertainment sources for adolescents and young adults. Video games, movies, television, and sporting events are all violent and routinely watched by adolescents and young males. Video games are considered the most violent of the four types due to the interaction that the person playing the game has (Huesmann & Miller, 1994). This means that the person playing the game is controlling the actions of the characters. The player manipulates all punches, kicks, etc. that are used by the character in the game. The person playing a video game’s purpose is usually to kill or harm all that is in the way. Young children instinctively imitate actions they observe, without always possessing the intellect or maturity to determine if such actions are appropriate. Due to their role-modeling capacity to promote real world violence, there is deep concern that playing violent video games, with their fully digitalized human images, will cause children to become more aggressive towards other children and become more tolerant of, and more likely to engage in, real-life violence (Provenzo, 1991). Winning in these games is usually obtained by graphically killing all enemies and opponents. This teaches younger players to be more aggressive and more violent (Anderson & Dill, 2000). Of the other sources of violent medias for adolescents, movies, television, music, and sporting events, video games have recently begun to take most of the blame for juvenile delinquency. According to the first study conducted by Anderson and Dill video game play was shown to be a major contributor in both types of delinquency, violent and nonviolent. This study’s primary focus was on negative consequences of long-term video game usage (Anderson & Dill). Violent video games seemed to cause more delinquency than those of educational or nonviolent content, further research needs to be produced based upon whether violent games really do determine the amount of delinquency compared to the amount caused by nonviolent video games (Anderson & Dill, 2000). The positive association with violent video games and aggressive personality is consistent with a developmental model in which extensive exposure to violent video games contributes to the formation of an aggressive personality (Anderson & Dill, 2000). A variable that needs to be considered in this experiment is whether or not people that are naturally aggressive are especially attracted to playing violent video games (Anderson & Dill). The second study conducted by Anderson and Dill primarily focused on the short-term effects of video game playing. Playing the video game Wolfenstein 3D in the experiment increased aggressive thoughts and aggressive behavior from the player, these thoughts were not necessarily acted out upon (Anderson & Dill, 2000). Study two found that in the short-term, playing a violent video game appears to affect aggression by triggering aggressive thoughts (Anderson & Dill, 2000). Based on the two studies conducted by Anderson and Dill, it was determined that when the choice and actions of video games are coupled with the games’ reinforcing properties, a strong learning experience is present (Anderson & Dill, 2000). This means that violent video games provide a learning experience for aggression and violent behaviors (Anderson & Dill, 2000). Longer-term effects seem to last longer as well, as the player learns and practices new aggression-related techniques in game playing, more and more aggression-related conflicts and situations arise (Anderson & Dill, 2000). A study that was produced using adolescents and video games revealed that after playing a violent video game, which coincidentally happened to be Mortal Kombat, children responded to a series of questions with more negative and aggressive answers (Kirsh, 1997). Children who played a nonviolent video game, NBA Jam: TE, answered the same questions and answered them without negative or aggressive responses (Kirsh, 1997). The availability of violent video games continues to be an issue for concerned parents. Teenage children do not have a hard time obtaining games that have a mature rating. This rating like a movie rating, states that the game is violent and should not be played by younger people. The Federal Trade Commission, FTC, conducted a study, on violent video games and accessibility to children. Of the 118 electronic games with a Mature rating for violence, the Commission selected for its study, 83, or 70 percent, targeted children under 17. The marketing plans for 60 of these, or 51 percent, expressly included children under 17 in the target audience. Documents for the remaining 23 games showed plans to advertise in magazines or on television shows with a majority or substantial under-17 audience (FTC, 2000). When Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold went into their high school and brutally murdered and harmed their classmates they were acting out a behavior in which they learned through playing violent video games. The two gunmen were attracted to and enjoyed playing violent video games. It is inconclusive whether or not they enjoyed the content of violent video games because of the widespread killing involved. It is clear though that their actions were wrong and can be at least partially blamed on the violent video games that they enjoyed playing. Based on this horrible incident and the studies conducted on violent video games and their effects it is clear that violent video games affect people’s behaviors. Adolescents and young men are especially vulnerable to learning the behaviors of the characters in which they are controlling. Video game violence will affect more people in the time to come, with technology expanding and the realization in games increasing. Bibliography: Works Cited Anderson, C. & Dill, K. (April 2000). Video Games and Aggressive Thoughts, Feelings, and Behavior in the Laboratory of Life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychololgy, 78(4). Ballard, M. & Weist, R. (March 1995). Mortal Kombat: The Effects of Violent Video Technology on Males’ Hostility and Cardiovascular Responding. ERIC Database. Cesarone, B. (January 1994). Video Games and Children. ERIC Digest. Emes, C. (1997). Is Pac Man eating our children? A review of the effect of video games on children. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 42, pp. 409-414. Fling, S., Smith, L., Rodriguez, T., Thornton, D., Atkins, E., & Nixon, K. (1992). Video games, aggression, and self-esteem: A survey. Social Behavior and Personality, 20, 39-46. Funk, J. (1993). Reevaluating the Impact of Video Games. Clinical Pediatrics, 32, February 2. pp. 86-90 Huesman, L. R. & Miller, L. S. (1994). Long-term effects of repeated exposure to media violence in childhood. Aggressive behavior: Current Perspectives. pp. 153-188. Kirsh, S. J. (1998). Seeing through Mortal Kombat colored glasses: Violent video games and the development of a short-term hostile attribution bias. Childhood, 5, 177-184. Poolet, E. (1999, May 10). Portrait of a deadly bond. Time, 26-32. Provenzo, E. (1991). Video Kids: Making Sense of Nintendo. Harvard University Press. Word Count: 1899
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