Study Finds Violent Video Games Reduce Hostility

Violent video games tend to get a bad reputation. Whenever some sociopath of a school kid wants to shoot up a school, the first thing people tend to ask was whether he played any violent video games like Grand Theft Auto instead of asking who were the idiotic adults who gave him or her-usually him-access to firepower. Even the video game studios have begun turning the tables saying that parents should not buy these games for their minor children in the first place. Politicians love to join a good group who opposes violent video games because those groups are usually of the voting age and are usually the most public.

But now a recent European study says violent video games may not be as bad as initially thought. The study gave young adults a frustrating task and allowed them to randomly unwind from it with either a violent game, a violent game where the player was the villain, a non-violent game, or nothing at all. No specifics of the games were mentioned, which does pose a gray area as to what games were considered violent. While I may gloss over killing a prostitute in GTA, I still consider the stage in We love Katamari where people rolled up into a giant snowball slowly stop twitching from asphyxiation and hypothermia one of the most violent images in my gaming history. As it turned out, the violent video games reduced hostility. More study is needed to draw data. But at least it is a new direction for those who keep blaming the video games. Given enough credibility in further studies, it might finally be time to establish that that preexisting personality problems are the bigger cause of violent behavior than mere want of emulating of a violent video game. I am surprised that movies are still getting less flak despite being more accessible and usually violent.

I personally feel there is merit in this study. I like using video games-violent or nonviolent-to calm myself when faced with a difficult situation in real life. On paper it does make sense to allow someone to take out one's frustrations or cravings for violence by beheading a few zombies or bludgeoning a few people with a pipe wrench during an online video game match. It is better to kill pixels than people, I always say. For those who say that crimes are caused by young children playing video games, I have one thing to say: Despite all the Nintendo playing I did as a child, I never once beat up a bunch of defenseless turtles while looking for a princess in a castle.

Though I must say I did develop a taste for mushrooms.