Post a Comment On: Internal Monologue

From GamePolitics:
In the study, student volunteers were shown bible passages containing references to violent acts such as rape, beatings and murder. Half of the survey group were then shown an additional passage indicating that God sanctioned violent retribution. Those who were given this additional information responded with increased aggression in a subsequent measurement. The Deseret News reports that the researchers believe their findings are consistent with other studies which show correlation between aggression and violent movies, music and video games. No doubt politicians will be falling all over themselves to keep Bibles out of the hands of impressionable youth. Ha.

Obviously, this study ties into one of my pet issues: the percieved connection between violent video games (which I play) and real-world criminal violence (from which I have so far managed to abstain).

I do not doubt that consuming violent media, biblical or otherwise, leads to higher measures of aggression on a subsequently administred test. I suspect that any form of arousal would lead to increased agression. It would be interesting to compare the effects of violent media to non-violent media that produced equal amounts of arousal. Or compare it to running around the block or some other arousing but non-violent physical activity.

What I would also like to see are studies examining the correlation, if any, between consumption of violent media and real-world behavior. Have people incarcerated for violent crimes played more violent video games than their non-incarcerated peers? Do members of Quake clans commit more violent crimes than their non-gaming SES equivalents? If we have kids play Counterstrike an hour a day, will they get in more playground fights than a control group that plays Tetris? This is the sort of research we need. There are too many anecdotes of the "Oh-my-this-killer-had-a-copy-of-Quake-on-his-computer" variety clouding the issue.

A lot of kids watch violent movies, play violent video games, listen to violent music, and are exposed to violent religious stories. But only some commit violent acts. Has the explosion in the popularity of video games and hip-hop music that started in the 80's correlated with an increase in violent crime during that time period? My understanding is that violent crime went down througout much of the 90's and 00's, just when graphically violent video games were becoming prominent.

If violent video games cause some amount of criminal violence, this should apply cross-culturally, no? Japanese people play lots of violent video games, and anime seems plenty violent. What does the violent media-real violence correlation look like in their culture? What about Koreans, who play more video games per capita than just about anybody, if my memories from my Microsoft days serve me well? Are they more violent?

It may very well be that there are some unpleasant correlations to be found. Maybe Grand Theft Auto III and its decendants are causal agents for some amount of real-world violence. But right now, I don't see it. I see people looking for something easy to blame for heinous acts of violence that are very hard to understand. They want someone easy to blame and who has a less effective political lobby than the gun industry. (Not that the gun industry is to blame either: Canada and Switzerland both have lots of guns, too, but much lower violence rates than the US, if my memories of Bowling for Columbine are correct.)

Also, there's a racial angle here to consider. GamePolitics quotes USC’s Karen Sternheimer:
The video game explanation constructs the white, middle-class shooters as victims of the power of video games, rather than fully culpable criminals. When boys from “good” neighborhoods are violent, they seem to be… created by video games rather than by their social circumstances. White, middle-class killers retain their status as children easily influenced by a game, victims of an allegedly dangerous product. African-American boys, apparently, are simply dangerous.