It is no argument that the world we live in today relies heavily upon technology, and technology comes in many forms. One controversial form is video games. Ever since the first game system, Atari, was released in the 1970s, the gaming industry has slowly evolved into a multi-billion dollar industry, with nearly every child in America playing some sort of video game. With the recent history of school shootings and what seems like a rise in childhood aggression, many parent organizations are calling for a ban on violent video games. While there is a positive association between playing violent video games and aggressive behavior in children, many other psychological and environmental factors need to be considered before we blame these games alone.
While some researchers believe other factors need to be considered before we blame video games alone for aggressive behavior in children, you cannot ignore the fact that numerous studies have been done to try and prove otherwise. In the case of a mother killing her children, a mental disorder will likely be blamed for the behavior while at the same time for an aggressive teenager, media and video game violence is often discussed as being responsible. Researchers (Sheese & Graziano, 2005), studied whether or not violent video games would cause participants to trust their counterpart and participate in an activity with them. In the study, two participants were randomly selected to play either a violent or non violent version of the video game Doom ™. Sheese and Graziano (2005) concluded that their current study indicates playing a violent video game may have negative effects on social behavior; they also show that the same video games may affect decisions to either cooperate or compete with other individuals. While this study shows how a violent video game can have an effect on the social behavior of a person, there are numerous studies that show other environmental factors need to be considered.
