Do you think that violence in the streets is caused by violent video games?

Question

Do you think that violence in the streets is caused by violent video games?

Answer 1

some of it, absolutely. What is the sense that is closest to our brains? The sight. Light travels very quickly, and what we see is instant. So what we see goes directly to our brains and in our unconscious mind, we think about it. Playing the video game repeatedly keeps the thoughts in our brains, and eventually, the thoughts turn to actions. Just like if youre with a friend for a long time. You start learning and getting traits from each other. Our minds start learning from those violent games, and the thought becomes an action which hurts many people.

Answer 2

No, because the people causing all the problems can't even afford video games...oh, but then again they do steal stuff. I still say no effect.

Answer 3

if your talking about america only the answer is no, but it doesn't help someone who is disturbed in the first place.

in ireland, south africa, and even several other countries outside  a war zone are just as bad as america when it comes to murder.

Answer 4

no, if anything its preventing it, when i feel mad or need to blow off some steam, i usually play a violent video game, its like therapy, and when I'm done i feel much better, and btw most of the people who will yes, r people who have never touched a game system, they just think they know what they're talking about

Answer 5

Don't buy these arguments by these people with too much time on their hands armed with reams of faulty statistics. There are a lot of reasons for violence but I would not worry about violent video games. ITS JUST A GAME! Politicians that hold these self righteous hearings on this subject really get on my nerves! Did that last sentence sound violent? Well if it did it had nothing to do with violent games. Its just I get tired of hearing people like Senator Joe Lieberman trying to ram his miss guided moral values down every ones throats for his own political reasons.

Answer 6

There are no correlation between violent video games and real violence. Real violence emerges from anger, frustration and suppression. Every single individual have now a days been exposed to daily violence in the Medias, movies ( average movies shows apx. 5 killings, by shootings, stabbings etc. ) and video games. It means, if we believe that virtually violence is causing real violence, that we all should be violent - and we are not. Only a fraction of us becomes violent and therefore the causes of violence has to be found elsewhere.

Answer 7

This is a good example of a post hoc fallacy.

All right, fine, the media is partially the reason why there is crime of any kind, but keep in mind that there are many socio-economic and psychological factors which contribute to crime. Poverty, illiteracy, family values, mental illnesses... these are just some of the reasons why crime exists, so you can't just dump all the blame on violent video games.

I play violent video games; I've played them since I was a kid. And yet now, 18 years later you would never hear of me blowing up my school or getting into gangs and getting into gang wars on the streets of the ghetto. My school record, as far as I know, is spotless. That proof enough for you?

Answer 8

Thumbs up for mIcHeLLe's answer.

To add to what she said, a pretty famous experiment by Albert Bandura in the 60's answered this clearly - that seeing other's like ourselves do something where they get a positive outcome predisposes us towards both wanting to do this thing and towards thinking we can successfully do it. The effect is called "modeling".

This link is to a video of Bandura's "Bobo the Clown" experiment where he got little kids to beat the c**p out of an inflated clown with sticks and hammers only by showing them a film clip of an adult mildly hitting the clown.  

The violence in the streets is caused by individuals.  The video games are influencing their decisions, and their lack of will to do otherwise leads them towards behaving violently.

EDIT:  For you all short on analytical capabilities, using yourself as a "proof" against large sample controlled research demonstrates your level of scientific wisdom. Post hoc fallacy is the wrong term to use against "a-priori" research that you disagree with. Claiming yourself as disproof of a bivariate relationship is a better example of post-hoc-fallacy. Similarly, I think we've all had plenty of alcoholics tell us "Intoxication doesn't lead to traffic fatalities, just look at me".

  Why when someone says that some violence is caused by video games are there hyperventilated retaliations that video games aren't the only cause of violence?  Where did anyone ever say that they were?

   The marketing industry thrives on people's denial that modeling has any influence on their attitudes towards behavior. In which case, I need to thank you for a great portion of my awesome career.