A wiser man than myself once said that sometimes the best research just takes the time to prove that common sense actually makes sense. Which is why I saw so thrilled to stumble across a bit of newly minted research dealing with video game violence. Patrick and Charlotte Markey (professors at Villanova and Rutgers respectively) recently published an article that shows what the more open minded (ie horribly biased) of us have always believed. In a woefully simplified
summary, video games are not the cause of violent behavior - personality problems are.
I absolutely love the analogy the authors make between violent video games and peanuts - potentially benign stimuli which can have very significant impacts on people because we process things differently.
Check out the full article, "Vulnerability to Violent Video Games: A Review and Integration of Personality Research" which was published in the Review of General Psychology.
FlashBack
summary, video games are not the cause of violent behavior - personality problems are.
I absolutely love the analogy the authors make between violent video games and peanuts - potentially benign stimuli which can have very significant impacts on people because we process things differently.
Check out the full article, "Vulnerability to Violent Video Games: A Review and Integration of Personality Research" which was published in the Review of General Psychology.
FlashBack
- If you have been a long time reader of the blog, you might remember Patrick Markey's name from a video I posted back in 2007 that dealt with similar research. The recently published piece deals more with looking at specific personality factors that contribute to one's susceptibility to being affected by violent media.
If you recall from Bowling for Columbine, Canadian teens play the same games as American teens at about the same amount, yet don't have the school shooting we do.