Computer games do not make people more prone to violence. That is the conclusion of British psychologists in the article of the journal Entertainment Computing. Discussion on the benefits and harms of computer games, their influence on the behavior of children and adults, and brain activity is conducted by scientists, politicians, public figures and concerned parents just probably the last twenty years.
Relatively recent to this topic joined neuroscientists in the end made the conclusion that some types of games can really have a positive impact on some of the parts of the brain, responsible for reflexes and memory, while others are forced to decline these departments.
Some researchers believe that computer games can develop a certain group of people a real dependence, and so strong that it is like a narcotic. Others complain that a high level of realism and freedom in games has reached such a level that occurring in them cruelty and violence in some cases can be “transferred” to the real world.
David Zendel and his colleagues from York University decided to test this by organizing a very unusual experiment, which was attended by several dozen volunteers, among them were gamers, and people who were far from similar.
“If games are really “programming” of a person, it would have to be categorized and to respond to concepts and objects which they contain, than to objects from the real world. It was quite unusual for the two games we studied,” says David Sends from York University.
For the experiment, scientists have developed two similar but different in content game. In one, players were asked to keep a car on the freeway and try to avoid collisions with trucks, and the second to take on the role of a mouse that was trying to catch a cat.
According to Singla, if the position of the opponents of the games is correct, then these games should leave a psychological impression in the minds of the players, making them more acutely and respond quickly to images of cats and cars and related words and ideas.
Following this approach, the researchers after each game session showed the participants of the experiment a set of pictures depicting various objects, animals and people, and asked to allocate them to one category or the other.
Measurements of reaction time and think of a response showed that the volunteers reacted to pictures of cars and cats with the same speed and attention as the rest of the photos that says that games do not change the human psyche.
Sendl said that similarly ended a study of whether the difference in impact on the psyche of the games with realistic physics and graphics and make them more primitive and abstract competition. No differences in this case, the researchers were also unable to detect.
“The collected data indicate the absence of a direct relation between the realism in games and violence in life. We found that in a logical task to complete the words of the participants in the experiments did not make the choice in the direction of concepts related to violence. In addition, we did not observe any difference in the data of individuals who played a realistic game with those who worked with the products with less reliable graphics,” commented Sendl.
According to psychologist, this suggests that statements about the psychological dangers of such a hobby, like computer games, yet have no scientific basis.
However, it should be noted that all these experiments were carried out with the participation of adults, so it is not clear whether this assertion is also valid in relation to children and adolescents. To find the answer to this question, scientists gather in the near future.
Study: computer games do not hurt the psyche
Nikolai Khizhnyak