Do Video Games Make You Violent?

When and why did the concern about video games making people violent first arise?

While the very first video arcade game was released in 1971, it wasn’t until 1976 when there was concern coming from the public about a video game called “Death Race”. This was the first controversial video game to cause a public uproar because of the game’s goal of running “gremlins” over, crying sounds from dying characters, and gravestones appearing after a death. Over the next few decades, more video games with more violent and sexual content were released. People increasingly became upset with the content of these video games because of the offensive depiction of characters like women amongst other questionable gameplay and mechanics. Then, people began to worry about the violence in video games. The first lawsuit relating to video games happened in 1997, where a high school shooter turned out to be a gamer, causing the victims’ parents to blame video games for the violent behavior.

What laws involving video games have been brought up in response to violence?

The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) was created in 1997 to give video games ratings for the appropriate audience from E for everyone, T for teens, M for mature, and so on. In the year 2000, the city of Indianapolis wanted to introduce a city ordinance to prohibit businesses with more than 5 video game machines to allow minors not accompanied by their parents to use those machines. There was a bill in 2002 that wanted to ban renting and selling video games to minors. Hillary Clinton had pushed for new video game regulations when she was a U.S. Senator after the popular game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas adopted controversial, sexual content. Michigan, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Minnesota, and California have all tried to create laws with some form of ban or limitation of video games being sold. There have been many attempts to put limits on how video games are being distributed, but they have never been passed because ultimately, there is no definite correlation between video games and people’s wellbeing and the country must uphold the freedom of speech under the first amendment which the art of video games can be argued falls under.

Is there a psychological correlation between video games and human behavior?

There is indeed a correlation between video games and human behavior, however, there have been two main sides to the argument on whether video games cause aggressive human behavior. Studies have shown that playing violent video games can cause an increase in violent thinking, behavior, and acts. Some people even believe this is a detrimental health problem since it would affect how people’s minds work, calling for more concern and help for mental health in regards to this. On the other side of the argument, some people do not think violent video games cause violent behavior. It just so happened that those who committed violent acts also played violent video games. There are more people who play violent video games who do not commit a crime compared to those who do. It can be argued that ultimately, it is one’s own morals, influences, and thinking that decide whether or not to adopt aggressive behavior, not just video games alone. Neither side is completely right or wrong, and studies continue to change and share different results. Some decades will show an increase in people playing video games and a decrease in violence while others will show vice versa.

Young gamer playing video game wearing headphones

References

Bartel, Christopher. “When Is Video Game Violence Wrong?” Www.ted.com, 17 Apr. 2018, www.ted.com/talks/christopher_bartel_when_is_video_game_violence_wrong?subtitle=en.

Cooper, Roanna, and Marc Zimmerman. “Do Video Games Influence Violent Behavior?” Michigan Youth Violence Prevention Center, 2024, yvpc.sph.umich.edu/video-games-influence-violent-behavior/.

National Coalition Against Censorship. “A Timeline of Video Game Controversies.” Ncac.org, 2018, ncac.org/resource/a-timeline-of-video-game-controversies.

Price, Anna. “To Play or Not to Play: Video Game Ratings and the Law | in Custodia Legis.” The Library of Congress, 5 Sept. 2023, blogs.loc.gov/law/2023/09/to-play-or-not-to-play-video-game-ratings-and-the-law/.

So to Speak Podcast. “So to Speak Podcast Transcript: Violent Video Games with Professor Patrick Markey | the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression.” Www.thefire.org, 20 Feb. 2020, www.thefire.org/research-learn/so-speak-podcast-transcript-violent-video-games-professor-patrick-markey.‌