Does Playing Violent Video Games Cause Aggressive Behavior?

DOES PLAYING VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES CAUSE

AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR?

Playing by the Rules

Cultural Policy Center, University of Chicago

27 October 2001

Jeffrey Goldstein, Ph.D.

University of Utrecht, The Netherlands

Some social psychologists argue that playing violent video games causes aggressive behavior, among other things (desensitization to violence, disinhibition of violence, belief in a Ð''scary world,' acquisition of cognitive schemas supportive of aggression). Three types of evidence are said to converge in support of this conclusion: correlational studies, field studies (which are typically correlational in nature), and laboratory experiments.

Correlational studies can tell us nothing about whether violent video games cause aggression. Even if we accept that there is a correlation between amount of time spent playing (violent) video games and aggressive behavior, there is no reason to think that games are the cause of aggression (Anderson & Dill, 2000; Colwell & Payne, 2000; Roe & Muijs, 1998). Furthermore, some correlational studies find no significant relationship with aggression (e.g., Sacher, 1993; van Schie & Wiegman, 1997).

One purpose of laboratory experiments is to study immediate effects of prior Ð''causes.' The focus of this paper is on the quality of experimental evidence used to support the argument that

1. PLAYING (2) VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES CAUSES

(3) AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR

In the typical laboratory experiment, university students are randomly assigned to play a violent video game or a nonviolent video game. The length of play varies from 4 minutes to 75 minutes. Following play, some measure of aggression is administered. We will examine each component of this situation, asking whether subjects have PLAYED a video game, whether the video game can be regarded as VIOLENT, and whether AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR has been measured..

1. PLAYING

violent video games?

Play is a voluntary, self-directed activity (Garvey, 1991), an experience that probably cannot be captured in a laboratory experiment. Jib Fowles (1999), discussing television violence, contrasts the experience of the experimental laboratory versus watching television at home.

"At home, everything is known; here, everything is unknown, demanding attentiveness. At home, the lights are low, the child may be prone and comfortable, and viewing is nonchalant; here, the room is overlighted, the child is seated upright, and the viewing is concentrated. Most signally, at home television viewing is an entirely voluntary activity: The child is in front of the set because the child has elected to do so and in most instances has elected the contentÐ'... In the behavioral laboratory, the child is compelled to watch and, worse, compelled to watch material not of the child's choosing and probably not of the child's likingÐ'... Furthermore, what the child views in a typical laboratory experiment will bear little resemblance to what the child views at home. The footage will comprise only a segment of a program and will feature only aggressive actions" (Fowles, 1999, p. 26).

Regarding video games, the duration of play is too short, typically 5-15 mins., for anything like the play experience to be duplicated (Calvert & Tan, 1994; Silvern, Lang & Williamson, 1987). The pleasant Ð''flow' state described by Csikszentmihalyi (1990) becomes unattainable.

In laboratory experiments, no one plays. Being required to play a violent video game on demand is no one's idea of an entertainment experience. It is like being forced to listen to someone else's favorite music; it sounds like noise.

Almost no studies of violent video games have considered how and why people play them, or why people play at all. Experimental research does not recognize the fact that video game players freely engage in play, and are always free to stop. They enter an imaginary world with a playful frame of mind, something entirely missing from laboratory studies of violent video games. One of the pleasures of play is this very suspension of reality. Laboratory experiments cannot tell us what the effects of playing video games are, because there is no sense in which participants in these studies "play."

2. Playing VIOLENT video games?

There is much confusion about the definition of "violence" and terms like "media violence" and "violent video games." Psychologists define violence and aggression as "the intentional injury of another person." However, there is neither intent to injure nor a living victim in a video game.

An article by Dill and Dill (1998) serves to illustrate these semantic problems. They argue that players must "act aggressively" and are then reinforced for this "aggression."

"In violent video games, aggression is often the main goal, and killing adversaries means winning the game and reaping the benefits. While in real life, murder is a crime, in a violent video game, murder is the most reinforced behaviorÐ'.... The violent video game player is an active aggressor and the players' behavioral repertoire is expanded to include new and varied aggressive alternatives."

"Ð'...If violent videogame play indeed depicts victims as deserving attacks, and if these video games tend to portray other humans as Ð''targets,' then reduced empathy is likely to be a consequence of violent videogame play, thus putting the player at risk for becoming a more violent individual."

What is called "video game violence" is simulated aggression, different from the real thing in countless ways (Goldstein, 1999). Video games cannot "reinforce" aggressive behavior since players do not engage