Games teach .. and yes, they can teach aggression

More study results - and these look rather reasonable. Two of America's eminent academics have been digging into whether videogames can teach violence, and their reasoning is, in short, yes of course they can. Games can teach anything, they say.

Like other fathers and sons, Douglas Gentile and his father have spent many hours arguing about video games. What makes them different is that Douglas, an Iowa State University assistant professor of psychology, is one of the country's top researchers on the effects of media on children. His father, J. Ronald Gentile, is a leading researcher on effective teaching and a distinguished teaching professor emeritus of educational psychology at the University of Buffalo, State University of New York. Through their discussions, they realized that video games use the same techniques that really great teachers use.

It goes on, as the two men realised they should analyse the popular question, whether videogames can teach aggression. They took a good sample of 2,500 youths, and proceeded to test over a sensible period of time, using teachers, the kids themselves, and their friends as reporting mechanisms:

Students who played multiple violent video games actually learned through those games to produce greater hostile actions and aggressive behaviors over a span of six months. [...]

"We know a lot about how to be an effective teacher, and we know a lot about how to use technology to teach," said lead author Douglas Gentile. "Video games use many of these techniques and are highly effective teachers. So we shouldn't be surprised that violent video games can teach aggression."

Violent videogames are the minority of videogames - I think 7-8% or so are classified 18, or Adult-only - but if played too much and too often, and critically, by someone too young, it's not surprising these sorts of results are coming through, is it?

The two academics started with third-graders - 8 year olds - which is interesting: an 8 year old is certainly too young to be playing violent, realistic videogames, and is also young enough to be extremely impressionable and perhaps more likely to go and "try it out", as kids do. (I'm assuming here, based on fuzzy memory and general kid behaviour.) Plus, playing an 18-rated game as a minor is going to be far more thrilling than as an 18 year old, if only for the Forbidden factor.

What I'm trying to say here is that I'm not surprised that games teach, and I also think it sensible to test kids too young to purchase such material: after all, kids can get their hands on all sorts of media today that they couldn't 20 years ago. The vast cornucopia of porn, violent movies and videos, replica guns, violent games, violent television - all of it, easily available to your average 10 year old, both in the playground and at the click of a button. The question is, what to do about it: you can't put the genie back in the bottle, so we need better ways of teaching kids how to handle this stuff, how to understand it, and how to use it.

Which is more teaching. For that, maybe we can use more videogames, too. There's an interesting thought.

Comments

[Jon K]

I agree wholeheartedly that games are essentially teachers, and can influence us in pretty much any way they choose. The problem when kids get hold of violent games is they are less likely to question and consider what they are taught.

I think it's important to isolate the elements of a game that are simply present from those that are taught, however. The primary lessons in team shooters are lessons of cooperation; the primary lessons in a fast-paced FPS are things like anticipation, aim, reflexes, route determination, evasion and weapon selection.

Games like Manhunt 2 are IMO controversial for the very reason that they teach aggression directly. Elements of the less controversial Godfather game follow a similar route by requiring you to extort businesses. As much as I enjoy throwing shop owners around to extort cash from them, picking on their weak points, there is no greater skill I am learning than that of bullying (far more so than in "Bully", ironically).

[Alice]

Mm, agreed. I never felt that Quake was violent, for instance; but Manhunt 1 - right at the beginning where you have to sneak up behind the big guys and cut their throats - EW. That was enough for me: can't see what good that can be teaching.

[Anthony Perez]

I remember reading an article very recently about how today's gamers will be tomorrow's leaders. http://mybroadband.co.za/news/Gaming/1808.html

There's something very real in the argument for videogames' ability to teach. While young minds are certainly impressionable, they're impressionable to everything equally as "bad" as gaming. It all comes down to how well the parents regulate their access.

With each generation there will be some kind of medium or illegal substance that will be experienced by kids many believe are inappropriate for them. You can't stop it, just as I couldn't stop from smelling marijuana in school when I was in 4th grade. Yet not all of these kids are messed up, hell some are doing extremely well.

I think how someone absorbs information and interprets it is far more important than the information itself, though I do believe kids should be shielded up to a certain age.

[bob]

You're assuming that they defined "violent" video games as those in the "18" category, but that isn't clear in the article. Certain previous studies have defined "violent videogames" in such a way that the games they categorized as violent were closer to "Mario" than "Manhunt." Their notion of violence included all games where advancement through the game was through aggression towards non-anthropomorphic entities. It pretty much covered everything but puzzle games, which is what made the previous studies so disturbing- all these games deemed suitable for kids were, according to the studies, actually teaching them aggressive behavior.
So I am curious how "violent" was defined in this study- it may be far broader than you realize.

[Alice]

Huh, that IS interesting.

I honestly can't see how a mario game could be considered dangerous, though. I mean, it beggars belief, that.

[Mr Tom]

Mario has led to a lot of kids kicking tortoises!

[Timbojones]

A minor point, but... It was WAY easier to get your hands on a replica gun 20 or 30 years ago. And they were generally more accurate replicas. Easier - at least more common - to get a hold of real guns, too.

The secret is to teach kids to respect the power of the weapon, the value of life, and the gruesomeness of death.