Statement to
the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
United States Senate
March 21, 2000
Submitted by David Walsh, Ph.D.
President, National Institute on Media and the Family
"Interactive Violence
and Children"
Background
Concern about video game violence
is not new. There were calls to ban violent games
as early as 1976 when Death Race, often
acknowledged as the first violent video game,
appeared on the market. Of course, the violence
in Death Race seems tame in comparison
with todays "first person shooters."
As technology advances, each generation of violent
games became more graphic and extreme. The processing
power of video game platforms has increased an
astonishing 188 fold in the past seven months.
The goal of creating virtual experiences draws
ever closer. The addition of sexual material and
crude language raises additional worries.
As the annual report cards issued by the National
Institute on Media and the Family have shown,
the most violent games still find their way into
the hands of millions of children and teens. Since
these games have become implicated in the string
of recent school shootings, concern has reached
new heights. This testimony brings together some
of the findings from research to determine if
these concerns are justified. In addition it provides
findings from ongoing research being conducted
at the National Institute on Media and the Family.
Review of Research
Literature
The first thing we learn from the research
is that it is the younger children who spend the
most time playing games. According to one study,
the time spent playing video and computer games
peaks between the ages of eight and thirteen (Roberts,
1999). A study we completed at the National Institute
on Media and the Family found a similar pattern
with game playing time peaking between eight and
fifteen (Gentile and Walsh, 1999). We also know
that youth, especially boys, gravitate to the
"action games," which include the "first
person shooters." In one study 50% of boys
listed violent games as their favorites (Buchman
and Funk, 1996). A growing number of children
and teens now have the technological skills to
customize the computer games. A recent development
is putting "skins" on the characters
in the games. This means that the player can insert
the images of real people and places thereby making
the games even more realistic.
Many pre-teens and young teenagers therefore spend
a significant amount of time playing electronic
games, with a preference for the violent ones.
We also know that they have easy and frequent
access to increasingly violent and realistic games.
The next important question is, of course, "What
are the effects of this?" Because the ultra-violent
games are relatively new, the research literature
is just beginning to accumulate. Research findings
appearing in the 1980s and early 1990s are irrelevant
because those studies did not include the types
of violent games that have proliferated in the
past six or seven years. For the last few years
most experts have pointed to the vast body of
research on television violence. That research
clearly shows that a heavy exposure causes negative
effects on children (Walsh, Brown, and Goldman,
1996).
Because there has been so little relevant research
specifically focusing on electronic games, some
state that there is no demonstration of harm to
children. That, of course, was the same argument
used to defend television violence for more than
three decades. It was only after many years of
research that that argument was abandoned. That
argument, however, will become harder to maintain
with regard to electronic games, because some
important research findings are starting to appear
that support the contention that the violence
in computer and video games may indeed have a
harmful effect.
I would like to highlight the findings of two
research projects that found similar results independently.
The first project was done by our collaborator
Paul
Lynch at the University of Oklahoma Medical
School. Lynch has been studying the physiological
reactions of teenagers to video games for ten
years. He found that violent video games caused
much greater physiological changes than non-violent
games. The changes were found for heart rate and
blood pressure as well as the aggression-related
hormones, adrenaline, noradrenaline, and testosterone.
A very important finding in Lynchs research is
that the effect was much greater for males who
pretested high on measures of anger and hostility.
In other words, the violent games do not seem
to affect everyone the same. Angry youth react
much more strongly to violent video games than
do more easy-going kids (Lynch, 1999).
This finding was confirmed in a sophisticated
research project completed by Craig Anderson of
Iowa State University and Karen Dill of Lenoir-Rhyne
College. In my judgement, Anderson and Dill have
executed the best study of video game violence
to date. It will be published in its entirety
in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Personality
and Social Psychology. They conducted two
separate studies, one of which was an experiment.
In the first study they found a positive correlation
between real-life aggressive behavior and violent
video game play. In addition, they discovered
that violent video game play was correlated with
delinquency. Like Lynch, they also found that
the correlation was much stronger for individuals
who are characteristically aggressive. It is also
noteworthy that Anderson and Dill found that the
college students who spent the most time playing
video games had the lowest grade point averages.
Correlational studies are important but do not
establish a causal link. It could be that aggressive
people who get into more trouble prefer violent
video games. To begin to address the causal question,
the two researchers designed an experiment. They
used games of the same difficulty thereby ruling
out frustration as a reason for aggression that
might result from playing a violent game. Those
students randomly assigned to play a violent game
showed increases in aggressive thoughts and aggressive
behavior. The students assigned to a non-violent
game did not.
National Institute on Media and
the Family Study on Computer and Video Games-Preliminary
Results
Douglas Gentile, Ph.D., Director
of Research at the National Institute on Media
and the Family in collaboration with Paul Lynch
of the University of Oklahoma and myself have
designed a program of research to determine the
effects of video and computer games on children
and teens. While the program of research will
take a number of years and sufficient funding
to complete, I am able to report preliminary findings
in this testimony.
These results are based on responses
to a survey administered to 137 teens in grades
8-12 in a large suburban school district near
a large midwestern city. 94 were students in general
classes. 43 were students in a special program
for "at risk students."
Electronic Game Habits
- 84% of teens overall play electronic games.
92% of boys play games.
- The average teen plays video games for 1
hour at a sitting (does not include teens
who dont play)
Among boys only, the average length of game
play at one sitting is 84 minutes (almost
1 ½ hours)
- 25% of teens who play games say they understand
all of the ESRB ratings, with an additional
29% saying they understand some of them.
- Only 15% of teens say that their parents
understand the ESRB ratings.
- 90% of teens say their parents "never"
check the ratings before allowing them to
buy or rent video games (another 8 percent
say their parents "rarely" check
the ratings).
- Only 1 percent of teens who play games say
their parents have ever kept them from getting
a game because of its rating.
- Only 56% of teens who own their own games
say that their parents know all of the games
they own. Only 46% of boys who own their own
games say that their parents know all of the
games they own.
- 14% of teens (18% of boys) who own their
own games say they have games their parents
wouldnt approve of if they knew what was
in them.
- 32% of boys who play video games download
video games from the Internet.
- 25% of teens (41% of boys) say they have
played so much that it interferes with their
homework.
- 13% of teens (21% of boys) say they have
done poorly on a school assignment or test
because they spent too much time playing video
games.
- 89% of teens (91% of boys) say that their
parents "never" put limits on how
much time they are allowed to play video games.
- 42% of teens (52% of boys) say that they
sometimes try to limit their own playing,
but only 70% of them (67% of boys) are successful
in limiting their own playing.
- The average teen likes a moderate amount
of violence in their video games (median =
5 on a scale of 1 to 10). Among boys only,
the average teen likes a fair amount of violence
in their games (median = 7 on a scale of 1
to 10).
- Over three-quarters (77%) of boys who play
video games at least "sometimes"
customize the video games they play.
- 41% of boys at least "sometimes"
visit game sites on the Internet, and 32%
of boys at least "sometimes" play
video games over the Internet.
- 15% of teens (29% of boys) say they have
felt like they were addicted to video games.
- Among boys only, teens spend an average
of 19 hours/week watching TV, 10 hours/week
playing video games (includes teens who play
zero hours), 18 hours/week listening to music,
and 1 hour/week reading for pleasure. (When
teens who never play are removed, the average
time/week playing video games is 11 hours.)
- Among at-risk boys only, teens spend an
average of 25 hours/week watching TV, 16 hours/week
playing video games (includes teens who play
zero hours), 19 hours/week listening to music,
and slightly more than 2 hours/week reading
for pleasure (138 minutes). (When teens who
never play are removed, the average time/week
playing video games is 16 Ό hours.)
- Boys expose themselves to more video game
violence than girls, and at-risk teens expose
themselves to more video game violence than
general students (defined from violence levels
of 3 favorite games and frequency of playing
each--based on Anderson & Dill approach)
Effects: School Performance
- Amount of time playing video games has a
negative impact on school performance, by
many different measures: Teens who play more
each week, play more yearly, and have played
more over their lifetimes perform more poorly
in school (as self-reported) than teens who
play less.
- Teens who say they like to have more violence
in their games perform more poorly in school
than teens who like less violence.
- Teens who named more violent games as their
favorite three games perform more poorly in
school than teens who named less violent games
as their favorites.
- Teens who expose themselves to more violence
in video games perform more poorly in school
than teens who expose themselves to less violence
in video games.
Effects: Arguments with Teachers
- Teens who prefer more violence in their
video games get into arguments with their
teachers more frequently than teens who prefer
less violence in their video games.
- Teens who expose themselves to more violence
in video games argue more frequently with
their teachers than teens who expose themselves
to less violence in video games.
Effects: Physical Fights
- Amount of time playing video games is positively
correlated with getting into physical fights,
by many different measures: Teens who play
more each week, play more yearly, and have
played more over their lifetimes are more
likely to have gotten into a fight in the
past year than teens who play less.
- Similarly, teens who say they are more familiar
with video games are more likely to have gotten
into a fight in the past year than teens who
are less familiar with video games.
- Teens who prefer more violence in their
video games are more likely to have gotten
into a physical fight in the past year than
teens who prefer less violence in their video
games.
- Teens who named more violent games as their
favorite three games are more likely to have
gotten into a physical fight in the past year
than teens who named less violent games as
their favorites.
- Teens who expose themselves to more violence
in video games are more likely to have gotten
into a physical fight in the past year than
teens who expose themselves to less violence
in video games.
Significant Differences between
General and At-Risk Teens
- At-risk teens perform more poorly in school.
- At-risk teens name more violent games as
their three favorite video games
- At-risk teens get into arguments with parents,
peers, and teachers more frequently than general
teens.
- Among boys only, at-risk boys are less likely
to say they usually feel "positive"
after playing video games.
Some Significant Differences
between Boys and Girls
- Boys are more familiar with video games
than girls.
- Boys play more frequently than girls.
- Boys are more likely to own their own games
than girls.
- Boys play longer at each sitting than girls
(means = 84 and 40 minutes, respectively).
- Boys like more violence in their video games
than girls.
- Boys play more each week than girls (means
= 10 and 3 hours, respectively).
- Boys name more violent games as their three
favorite games than girls.
- Boys expose themselves to more video game
violence than girls.
These sample sizes provide data
accurate to ±10% when generalizing to general
populations of teens, and to ±17% when generalizing
to at-risk populations of teens.
Additional studies will need to
be completed before we can claim that there is
a demonstrated cause effect relationship between
video game violence and real life aggression.
However, the recent research developments show
that the concern about the impact of violent video
games is justified. It should act as a spur for
both more research and for greater vigilance over
the video and computer game diet of children and
youth.
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