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iBubba wrote:

I am your ordinary, mostly average human being

iBubba wrote:

Loving Uniquely Sensual Toasters

XYZ wrote:

The connection was seen in Fahrenheit 9/11, too. One soldier said shooting people with his tank was very much like playing a video game. The Armed Forces use video games to train, and a video game was released as a recruiting tool.

Perhaps they read Orson Scott Cards, "Enders Game". While I didn't get into the series, that was an interesting book.

For those who haven't read it, the idea is that these kids are "training" in a simulator for war against an alien enemy, the Buggers, who are attacking Earth. The brightest of the bunch, Andrew Wiggin (nicknamed Ender) ends up being promoted higher and higher, starting at the tender age of 6. As he progresses through harder and harder battles, he begins to question what the point is - until he completes the last mission, where he anhilates "the enemy" - thinking that he is now qualified to go to war.

Then, he is told that he has really been directing real fighters all along, and is a hero for having won the war for humanity. He hadn't been told that every time he got a "simulated" kill, actual aliens were being killed - or that everytime one of his own fighters were lost, an actual pilot was killed. As such, he didn't have any moral qualms about what he was doing - or emotional attachment to either his own pilots or the enemy. He was just playing a game, and the only motivation was to win.

The end of the book is about his sense of remorse as the realization of how many people and aliens were dead as a result of his desire to win, and the realization that every capricious action he made because he was tired of playing had cost many people he had never met their lives.

It's a good read - even if you don't like sci-fi.

Terra Nova wrote:

Contradictions (1)
Here's something that's been bothering me for a while about computer games in general and virtual worlds in particular.

For many years, suggestions have been made by politicians and in the media that there is a link between the playing of computer games and the committing of acts of real-world violence. They feel that if you play a violent computer game, it teaches you to be violent in reallife. Game-savvy people like us will typically regard these opinions as founded on ignorance, and argue that they should not be given credence.

One of the larger sub-branches of game research concerns educational gaming. Its premiss is that kids don't always like traditional teaching methods, but they love games, so we should design games that help teach them things. That way, learning will be fun, so children will want to learn.

Now, isn't there a contradiction here? On the one hand, we're saying that no no no, games don't teach people all those bad things, but on the other hand we're saying that yes yes yes, games do teach people all these good things. Can we really sustain both these positions? Is there something about how games teach (or how people learn) that genuinely does separate desirable from undesirable results? Or are we changing our story depending on whether we're being threatened with banning or being promised kudos?

Link

Couldn't have said it better myself. Studies are showing that educational games have little effect. So if the good games don't work/can't help/bear little influence then you have to concede that bad games would be the same. Games are just games.

XYZ wrote:

The connection was seen in Fahrenheit 9/11, too. One soldier said shooting people with his tank was very much like playing a video game. The Armed Forces use video games to train, and a video game was released as a recruiting tool.

That's not a connection. That in no way suggests/supports that playing video games leads to violent behaviour. Simulators are often used to train troops, pilots, etc. What does that have to do with cause/effect??

The psychological research suggests that social conditioning through violent/war video games may have an effect on the politics of the gamers. For instance, if we look at Rome, we can see that social conditioning made people politically supportive of things like the gladitorial games. Social conditioning of modern America makes people not supportive of such things. Yet, a society in the future may look at our boxing as an example of something along the lines of the gladiatorial games and other Roman violence.

Two men/women voluntarily entering the ring for sport isn't exactly the same as throwing prisoners into a ring to be mauled by tigers. And I'm still not seeing the connection between Rome and video games.

The question is whether or not playing war games conditions people to accept war. I think it's logical to assume that it does, since research has shown that violent behavior leads to further violent behavior. That study with the Bobo doll showed kids not just bopping Bobo on the head. They stabbed him in the throat, and did all sorts of extreme things. Other kids who didn't see the doll beaten by an adult didn't do anything violent. The catharsis effect theory has been debunked. Instead of "releasing violence to neutralize it by channeling into a safe object", violent behavior is a form of rehearsal that leads to, if not behavior, at least a similar way of solving problems/reacting mentally to situations.

The reason why your assumption is illogical is because the act of playing video games is not in itself violent. Sitting on my couch playing Ghost Recon isn't going to illicit anything more serious than a whole lot of swearing.

charon, the catharsis theory has been debunked.

The stuff about Bobo is mostly unrelated despite being in the same paragraph. It is loosely related, though, because it shows that the kids didn't have pent up violence to release on Bobo. Instead, they imitated adults. They learned a role from adults (attacker of Bobo) and played that role.

XYZ wrote:

charon, the catharsis theory has been debunked.

Repeating it doesn't make it true. If the rest of the paragraph wasn't meant to support the claim, then what was?

XYZ wrote:

the act of playing video games is not in itself violent. Sitting on my couch playing Ghost Recon isn't going to illicit anything more serious than a whole lot of swearing.

Studies have shown a correlation between violent video games and violent thoughts and behaviors. Role playing can be very powerful.

You don't need "studies" to show that when you play violent video games, you think about violence.  But it's a whole 'nother ballpark to claim that role-playing violence uniformly encourages violent tendencies.

XYZ wrote:

The Milgrim experiment, the prison experiment conducted in a psychology department in the 70s, Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes, and the Ingroup-Outgroup studies are all worthy of consideration, in addition to numerous other studies that directly examine the role of media violence and video game violence.

That means nothing to me.  I know of the Milgram experiment, but that tells me that some people are cruel and/or too meek to refuse orders.  I know of the prison experiment, but that tells us what positions of absolute power do to people.  I know of the Blue Eyes/Brown eyes study, but that tells us about the harmful effects of stereotyping.  And I don't know what "other studies" you're referring to.  You'll need to try harder than that.

XYZ wrote:

My point was not necessarily about violent behavior, either. It was about a possible higher tolerance for war and other aspects of neo-con politics.

The repeated references to conservative (or is it neocon now?) politics is beginning to look silly.  What do conservatives have to do with video games?  State it plainly and back it up.

Last edited by charon (2006-01-26 4:12 pm)

freecat wrote:

Duh. Carl Rove is evil. Violent video games are evil. Max Payne is a rapist, and something about Diebold voting machines. It all makes sense, dammit!

And I'm sure that the Vatican is endorsing it all.

Tallgeese wrote:

freecat wrote:

Duh. Carl Rove is evil. Violent video games are evil. Max Payne is a rapist, and something about Diebold voting machines. It all makes sense, dammit!

And I'm sure that the Vatican is endorsing it all.

Holy smurf I totally forgot that part!

midgetcop wrote:

Proving that there is a correlation does NOT prove cause.

I think that's pretty much all that needs to be said about this thread.

iBubba wrote:

Farmerkev wrote:

Duke Stratosphere wrote:

According to this the juvenile crime rate reached an all-time low in 1997, anyway, so I guess it appears to be going down overall.

I'm sure that was only because Clinton was in office.
It's surely skyrocketed to a billion times the previous high with the conservatives and Adolf Bush in power.

Thank you for participating. Idiot.

I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to be just as much of a smartass as the "gang".
If you find the over the cliff liberal position to be annoying I'm surprised you make your way through most threads here.

charon wrote:

Sitting at a computer isn't violent behavior in itself, so it only counts if engaging in a fantasy of violence is sufficiently like actually performing violence.  I wouldn't enjoy violent video games if I thought there was actual violence involved.

You're oversimplifying.

Aggression forms:
All: behavior that's intended to hurt someone physically or psychologically. Examples: punch. insult.
Hostile aggression: results from negative emotional states. Examples: road rage. jealousy-induced assault.
Instrumental aggression: motivated by goals other than harming target. Examples: armed robbery. spanking.
Relational aggression: behavior intended to damage another's relationships. Examples: gossip. ridicule.

General Aggression Model (GAM):
- aggressive thoughts
- aggressive feelings
- physiological arousal
"aggressive behavior is the result of a chain of processes"; this model integrates other theories.

other theories and their outlook and/or limitations:
frustration-aggression hypothesis: (interference with obtaining desired goals)
problems: frustration isn't only factor. catharsis is a myth. revision says aggression is sometimes caused by frustration.
excitation transfer model: arousal from any source can increase aggression.
problems: doesn't address most common forms of aggression.
social learning theory: aggressive responses are learned from observation.
focuses on how aggression is learned rather than when aggression will occur.
cognitive neoassociative model: unpleasant events arouse negative emotions which cause aggression if aggression cues in the situation activate fight/flight anger schemes. applies recent work in social cognition to aggression.

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Displaced aggression
aggression is directed toward something other than the source of frustration
Catharsis
getting aggression “out of one’s system”
doesn’t work
opportunities for aggression usually heighten subsequent aggression

Excitation Transfer

Unrelated physiological arousal can be linked to anger-related thoughts and cognitions
This can increase anger-related aggression

Social Learning Theory(Albert Bandura)

Humans learn many kinds of responses simply by observing others
aggressive responses can be learned through the same process
Bobo doll experiments are an example

Cognitive Neoassociation Model

Does the gun pull the trigger?
Priming of aggressive thoughts and behaviors
Studies such as the one where guns were placed in a room are relevant.

Cognitive Neoassociation Model

Unpleasant event arouses negative emotion
Negative emotion triggers two schemas:
tendency to fight. tendency toward flight
These schemas activate anger and fear
cues in the environment guide behavior toward one set of responses or the other

The General Aggression Model incorporates aspects of frustration/aggression, excitation transfer, social learning, cognitive neoassociation

Culture and aggression
there are cultural differences in levels of aggressive behavior, as typically measured by rates of homicide or other violent crime
the United States, for example, generally has the highest rate of homicide among industrialized nations

Mob violence may be due to:
deindividuation
conformity pressure
Mob violence may be organized (e.g., the Klan)             or disorganized (e.g., a riot)

Television violence
longitudinal studies reveal that aggressive adults had watched more violence on television as children and had identified more closely with aggressive characters then did less-aggressive adults

Violent video games
some researchers have concluded that the available evidence linking game playing and aggression is marred by methodological flaws that limit strong conclusions

other researchers have found significant effects relating game playing to increased aggression. still others have found correlating issues, such as reduced frontal lobe activity and development.

http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/caa/

Controlling anger

cognitive-relaxation coping skills training and cognitive restructuring contribute to this process
Teaching alternatives to aggression
communication and empathy are key
Reducing aversive environments
minimizing physical discomfort is one approach

Professor Kawashima is quoted by The Observer as saying "There is a problem we will have with a new generation of children - who play computer games - that we have never seen before.  The implications are very serious for an increasingly violent society and these students will be doing more and more bad things if they are playing games and not doing other things like reading aloud or learning arithmetic."  He appears convinced that children who play computer and video games excessively will not develop their frontal lobes and may be more prone to act more violently as they grow up.

http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/family … deojap.htm

Research published in 2000 demonstrates that playing violent video games can increase a person's aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behavior.  Two studies by psychologists Craig Anderson and Karen Dill published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology looked at the effects of violent video games in the lab and in real life.  This powerful combination of two studies presents persuasive evidence that violent video games do indeed increase aggression in some players.
....
The present research demonstrated that in both a correlational investigation using self-reports of real-world aggressive behaviors and an experimental investigation using a standard, objective laboratory measure of aggression, violent video game play was positively related to increases in aggressive behavior. In the laboratory, college students who played a violent video game behaved more aggressively toward an opponent than did students who had played a nonviolent video game. Outside the laboratory, students who reported playing more violent video games over a period of years also engaged in more aggressive behavior in their own lives. Both types of studies–correlational—real delinquent behaviors and experimental—laboratory aggressive behaviors have their strengths and weaknesses. The convergence of findings across such disparate methods lends considerable strength to the main hypothesis that exposure to violent video games can increase aggressive behavior. (Anderson & Dill, 2000)

http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/family … olence.htm

kb5zhh wrote:

Farmerkev wrote:

iBubba wrote:

Thank you for participating. Idiot.

I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to be just as much of a smartass as the "gang".
If you find the over the cliff liberal position to be annoying I'm surprised you make your way through most threads here.

The "i know you are but what am I" retort was old when I was in 2nd grade.

I don't think that what what I was trying to say at all.
Perhaps I should clarify.