Violent Video Game Debate
Violent Video Game Debate:
Position: Against
Hook: A lot of people in this room alone have probably at least once played a violent video game or at least have seen someone play a game that is violent. Games such as Call of Duty, Halo, or Gears of War. Heck I own all three of those games, but that’s beside the point. What good can come out of playing games where you repetitively kill others and see some ridiculous gory images? Honestly what good can come out of this when developing minds are playing games where they shoot peoples heads off over and over?
Like I said, yeah I myself have played these games and haven’t really thought about the effects of playing them but the statistics and studies don’t lie when it comes to linking violent video games with increased aggression in mainly teenagers, and to play the games so much to where it numbs your mind and you have no concept of what is actually going on in reality around you.
Argument 1: Research finds that children who play violent video games can become violent themselves, but are these people just mimicking what they see on the screen or do the games leave lasting effects on the brain? I mean that would be pretty messed up if a video game could have negative lasting effects on the brain right? Well…
Time Magazine reported on a study conducted by Dr. Vincent Mathews and his colleagues at Indiana University where they took a group of 28 students all young adult males and they randomly assigned the students to play either a violent, first person shooter game or a non-violent one every day for a week. None of the the participants had much previous gaming experience.
At the beginning of the study, researchers used functional MRI to scan brain activity in the participants, while they completed lab-based tasks involving either emotional or non-emotional content. A week later after playing their games every day for that week they were scanned again as they repeated the same tasks.
At the start of the study,
Position: Against
Hook: A lot of people in this room alone have probably at least once played a violent video game or at least have seen someone play a game that is violent. Games such as Call of Duty, Halo, or Gears of War. Heck I own all three of those games, but that’s beside the point. What good can come out of playing games where you repetitively kill others and see some ridiculous gory images? Honestly what good can come out of this when developing minds are playing games where they shoot peoples heads off over and over?
Like I said, yeah I myself have played these games and haven’t really thought about the effects of playing them but the statistics and studies don’t lie when it comes to linking violent video games with increased aggression in mainly teenagers, and to play the games so much to where it numbs your mind and you have no concept of what is actually going on in reality around you.
Argument 1: Research finds that children who play violent video games can become violent themselves, but are these people just mimicking what they see on the screen or do the games leave lasting effects on the brain? I mean that would be pretty messed up if a video game could have negative lasting effects on the brain right? Well…
Time Magazine reported on a study conducted by Dr. Vincent Mathews and his colleagues at Indiana University where they took a group of 28 students all young adult males and they randomly assigned the students to play either a violent, first person shooter game or a non-violent one every day for a week. None of the the participants had much previous gaming experience.
At the beginning of the study, researchers used functional MRI to scan brain activity in the participants, while they completed lab-based tasks involving either emotional or non-emotional content. A week later after playing their games every day for that week they were scanned again as they repeated the same tasks.
At the start of the study,