Essay

Video Games and Children

In many ways there is an irony about the one thing that the youth of today love, video games. Today’s youth have so much fun with video games yet they are unaware of the facts that hinder their ability to play care free. Many children today play video games more and more throughout the day which in turn has many side effects due to this prolonged use. Playing video games may also have an effect on their social structure and also playing violent video games may lead to the youth becoming aggressive in certain situations. In the world we live in now too many young kids are able to get their hands on games that are rated beyond their age. Video games aren’t as beneficial for the kids as people think.

Majority of children are now playing video games more and more as well as spending more time each day on them, “79% of American children now play computer or video games on a regular basis” (D. Walsh). A study that was conducted by H. Cummings discovered that children as young as 10 spent on average “58 minutes during the week” and on average “1 hour and 37 minutes on the weekend”, the time playing video games throughout the week added is equivalent to spending a whole day at school. If these statistics are an average then there are children playing longer than these times which in turn must have some kind of detrimental effect on their physical health.

Children that are playing video games in large amounts of time start to show physical side effects and in some cases extreme effects. Some of the physical side effects are mostly hand and arm related symptoms. “65% of video game players examined complained of blisters, calluses, sore tendons and numbness of fingers, hand and elbows directly as a result of their playing” (B. Gunter, 1998). Some other symptoms that are stated on the Raising Children Network are that they can receive eye strain and also headaches due to playing video games to long (2007). There are also some extreme effects of playing video games such as seizures. A study by B. Gunter states that “a further published case of video game-induced seizure involved a 13-year-old girl who had been playing a Nintendo game for three hours with only a short break” (1998). Seizures may be rare in the majority of children however parents need not to take the risk if they do not know if their children are susceptible to seizures. The minor symptoms can be treated by just stopping the amount of time the children play the video games.

Another negative effect that video games have on children is that they may have a direct link to the way they live their social life. Many children play games in isolated situations especially young children as they have not yet developed a social group. At school children may show no cooperation in the classroom this may be due to the fact of early video game playing instead of playing with friends regularly. “Children who are unengaged or unenthusiastic about group activities and classroom instruction tend to be attracted to the solitary nature of video games, adding to antisocial tendencies” (RCN, 2007). Children do not realise that they can affect the way their social life is going to plan out due to the fact of playing video games for far too long, once again it is the parents that should be informed to the dangers of the longevity of playing video games. “Playing computer games for long periods of time alone can make people become reclusive and introverted. It can also give children a false sense of reality” (J. Gummow, 2004). This statement shows just some of the negative social problems that the children may require.

Social effects on the children may lead to other symptoms; playing violent video games may indeed show some behaviors such as violence and aggression toward other peers. “Playing a lot of violent video games is related to having more aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behaviours” which is stated by C. Anderson & B. Bushman (2001). This consecutively may also affect the children in other social behaviours such as their ability to empathise and care for other peers. This is proved to be true by C. Anderson and B. Bushman stating “Playing violent games is also related to children being less willing to be caring and helpful towards their peers. Importantly, research has shown that these effects happen just as much for non-aggressive children as they do for children who already have aggressive tendencies” (2001). Certain types of video games effect children in certain ways and the violent games are the ones that affect the children the most.

There are also violent video games that have a rating of M15+ or M17+ that the children all around the world are playing. Also the children are buying these games and also receiving these games as presents. “In 50 percent of the cases, a youth can purchase an M-rated videogame with nobody at the cash register taking notice, the institute said” (Dance with shadows, 8 Dec, 2007 ). This is an alarming fact that the children have such an easy access to the availability of these games. The violent video games are the games that affect the young children in many psychological factors as previously stated yet the children can get access to the games before they are mature enough.

Children as young as ten play not just normal video games they play violent video games as well. It is beneficial to play video games as long as the children play non violent video games and play in short periods leaving most of the day to get outside and exercise. However children are not doing this and the rate of young children playing video games is rising. All of the negative effects that have been stated prove that young children and video games is a matter not to be taken lightly.
REFERENCES

Anderson, C., & Bushman, B. (2001). Effects of Violent Video Games on Aggressive Behavior, Aggressive Cognition, Aggressive Affect, Physiological Arousal, and Prosocial Behavior: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Scientific Literature,Psychological Science, Volume 12 Issue 5 Page 353-359,
Anderson, C., & Gentile, D.A, (2001). Psychology Matters, Violent Video Games – Psychologists Help Protect Children from Harmful Effects, Retrieved on 22/05/08 from http://www.psychologymatters.org/videogames.html
Cummings, H., (nda). Effects Of Video Game Playing On Children, Copy write National Institute on Media and the Family, Retrieved on 23/05/08 from http://www.mediafamily.org/facts/facts_effect.shtml
Gunter, B., (1998). The Effects of Video Games on Children, The Myth Unmasked, pp.110 111
Gummow, J., (2004) 25 Oct Computer Games: Social Implications, Retrieved on 22/05/08 from http://wiki.mediaculture.org.au/index.php/Computer_Games:_Social_Implications
RCN, (2007). Raising Children Network. Retrieved on 21/05/08 from http://raisingchildren.net.au/
Unknown, (2007). Dance with the shadows, It’s easy for kids in US to buy adult-rated video-games, Retrieved on 22/05/08 from http://www.dancewithshadows.com/society/minor-adult-games.asp
Walsh, D., (2007) Video Game Violence and Public Policy, Ph.D.National Institute on Media and the Family, Retrieved on 21/05/08 from http://culturalpolicy.uchicago.edu/conf2001/papers/walsh.html