Evidence Regarding Video Game Violence

Running head: EVIDENCE REGARDING VIDEO GAME VIOLENCE
EVIDENCE REGARDING VIDEO GAME VIOLENCE
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

1
EVIDENCE REGARDING VIDEO GAME VIOLENCE
Introduction
The essay aims to analyze the affect of violent video games on the behavior of those
playing these games. The essay will first explain the meaning of video game violence followed
by the evidences that support this notion and those that oppose it as well. The analysis is
important because cases of violent behaviors such as mass shootings in schools and other places
have seen a sharp in the last few years. Many of these incidences have been related to video
game violence. It is thus important to analyze whether video games do cause violent or
aggressive behavior. The essay will make use of four evidences to find the link between violent
video games and aggressive behavior.
Discussion
Video game violence refers to the aggressive behavior demonstrated by players
especially young adults after being exposed to violent video games. Video games are considered
violent when these involve players to commit murders and other such crimes just for
entertainment purpose. With the introduction of online multiplayer games and the latest Virtual
Reality (VR) games, the level of violent video games has reached a new height. However, it
would be controversial to state that violent video games are the only reason behind aggressive
and violent behavior. Research on violent video games and aggression has focused on the change
in behavior of young people after playing video games. Much of the research suggests
contradicting claims regarding the link between violent video games and aggressive behavior.
According to the American Psychological Association (APA), “the arrival of a new
generation of ultraviolent video games beginning in the early 1990s and continuing unabated to
the present resulted in large numbers of children and youth participating in entertainment

2
EVIDENCE REGARDING VIDEO GAME VIOLENCE
violence” (Apa.org, 2019). While some studies have found significant effects of video game
violence on aggressive behavior, other studies have yielded insignificants links to video game
violence and aggressive behavior.
Krahé and Möller (2010) conducted a longitudinal study on 1237 German high school
students coming from seventh and eighth grade to find the correlation between media violence
and aggressive behavior. The authors conducted cross-lagged panel analysis and reverse analysis
to find the results. While the cross-lagged panel analysis found significant relation between video
game violence, “higher physical aggression, and lower empathy”, the reverse paths showed no
links between aggression and media violence (Krahé & Möller, 2010). The results also indicated
that non-violent video games had no significant influence on the students. The authors concluded
that most of the longitudinal studies have focused on aggressive behavior as the only outcome of
media violence whereas other factors have not been considered that include lowered empathy
and depression. In another study, Ferguson et al. (2014) found that trait aggression, stress,
parental involvement, participation in extracurricular activities and family support were more
influential in the aggressive behavior of young adolescents than violent video games. The
authors conducted their study on 1254 seventh and eighth grade students. The results revealed
that exposure to violent video games were not “predictive of delinquency and bullying”. On the
contrary, Anderson et al. (2010) performed a meta-analytic review of the effects of video game
violence on aggressive behavior, aggressive effect and cognition, physiological arousal,
prosocial behavior and desensitization or empathy. They performed the review on six unique
features including longitudinal studies for all the outcomes and cross-cultural comparisons
amongst others. Their results indicated that exposure to violent video games “is a causal risk
factor for increased aggressive behavior, aggressive affect and cognition and reduced empathy