There has always been heated debate among society of whether or not violence in media, with television being the most popular example, can have permanent negative effects on human behavior, especially among the youth (Anderson and Murphy, 423). Video games are a phenomenon of modern times, which many consider as art and at times even educational. Nonetheless, there are some games that push the limits in terms of their graphic, sexual and violent content. It is this category we have come to stigmatized and conduct research on to find out if they in fact, do trigger aggressive tendencies and therefore, cause violent acts in those who played them. Unfortunately, males have been the main focus of such studies and little effort has been done to look at the other side of the coin: female players (Anderson and Murphy, 423). Perhaps it is because women, as proven by the small amount of offenders when compared to men in the criminal justice system, are not convicted as frequently. Therefore showing, that they are less involved in criminally violent activities, do no spend as much time and have little interest in violent video-games, hence they are not affected as much by this media (Anderson and Murphy, 424).
In the article, “Violent video games and aggressive behavior in young women,” by Christine Murphy and Craig Anderson from the University of Saint Louis and Iowa State respectively, they do a study on female players to test the behavioral effects immediately after a 20 minute violent video-game session. The two video games used were Street Fighter II and Oh No! More Lemmings, and in both games female players were team-up against an opposing player (Anderson and Murphy, 424). They found out that a quick exposure to playing violent video games did indeed cause a negative alteration on behavior in the participants, but that it was mainly motivated by revenge reasons, something they called “revenge motivation. Another important factor to mention, as Anderson and Murphy suggested, is that aggressive behavior can become of a bigger magnitude if the user controls a character of the same sex (Anderson and Murphy, 423).
In Anderson and Murphy’s findings, they discovered that the chances for increased aggression were high when playing violent video-games. Such an elevated state of aggression, was a direct result of feelings of retaliation against the opposing player, and not simply a random effect of media exposure (Anderson and Murphy, 428). The quantity of participants was small and as such would require a bigger pool to allow further testing on the validity of the results. It would also be necessary to dissect violent in-game characteristics, to find the factors triggering aggressive reactions. Nevertheless, it is important to mention that past research on long-term effects of violence in media, has provided proof that exposure has negative behavioral and anti-social consequences on users, with young ones affected the most. It is believed that violence in video-games is more harmful than in television, especially because of the former’s “engaging and active nature” (Anderson and Murphy, 428).
In the article, “Violent video games and aggressive behavior in young women,” by Christine Murphy and Craig Anderson from the University of Saint Louis and Iowa State respectively, they do a study on female players to test the behavioral effects immediately after a 20 minute violent video-game session. The two video games used were Street Fighter II and Oh No! More Lemmings, and in both games female players were team-up against an opposing player (Anderson and Murphy, 424). They found out that a quick exposure to playing violent video games did indeed cause a negative alteration on behavior in the participants, but that it was mainly motivated by revenge reasons, something they called “revenge motivation. Another important factor to mention, as Anderson and Murphy suggested, is that aggressive behavior can become of a bigger magnitude if the user controls a character of the same sex (Anderson and Murphy, 423).
In Anderson and Murphy’s findings, they discovered that the chances for increased aggression were high when playing violent video-games. Such an elevated state of aggression, was a direct result of feelings of retaliation against the opposing player, and not simply a random effect of media exposure (Anderson and Murphy, 428). The quantity of participants was small and as such would require a bigger pool to allow further testing on the validity of the results. It would also be necessary to dissect violent in-game characteristics, to find the factors triggering aggressive reactions. Nevertheless, it is important to mention that past research on long-term effects of violence in media, has provided proof that exposure has negative behavioral and anti-social consequences on users, with young ones affected the most. It is believed that violence in video-games is more harmful than in television, especially because of the former’s “engaging and active nature” (Anderson and Murphy, 428).