essay about disadvantages of video games

Edward Luker, L.P.C.

Psychiatry & psychology.

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Are video games, screens another addiction?

• Pediatric Medicine

In an increasingly digital world, most people own multiple electronic devices with screens. However, many parents worry about the effects of screen use on themselves and their children.

With screens virtually everywhere, controlling a child's screen time can be challenging. How can you manage your children's screen time? How will you know if you or your children are addicted to screens or video games?

Is screen time damaging?

It's difficult to avoid screens completely, especially with their importance at work and school. However, excessive screen time can affect a persons mental, social and physical health.

Too much screen time has been linked to:

• Poor sleep or insomnia
• Behavioral problems, including impulsive actions
• Loss of social skills
• Less time for play
• Neck and back problems
• Difficulties with work or school

Screen time can be engaging for people of all ages. This is because their brains process and react to the sensory input as if it were happening to them. For example, many people have cried, laughed or been startled while watching a movie. This same type of engagement is possible when a person plays a video game.

While playing a video game, the person's brain processes the scenario as if it were real. If the game depicts a dangerous or violent situation, the gamer's body reacts accordingly. This "fight-or-flight response" to that perceived danger is triggered by exposure to intense stimulation and violence in the game. Excessive video game use can lead to the brain being revved up in a constant state of hyperarousal.

Hyperarousal looks different for each person. It can include difficulties with paying attention, managing emotions, controlling impulses, following directions and tolerating frustration. Some adults or children struggle with expressing compassion and creativity, and have a decreased interest in learning. This can lead to a lack of empathy for others, which can lead to violence. Also, kids who rely on screens and social media to interact with others typically feel lonelier than kids who interact in person.

Chronic hyperarousal can have physical symptoms, as well, such as decreased immune function, irritability, jittery feelings, depression and unstable blood sugar levels. In children, some can develop cravings for sweets while playing video games. Combined with the sedentary nature of gaming, children's diet and weight can be negatively affected, as well. Sometimes children will even avoid stopping the game to go to the restroom, which can lead to hygiene issues.

How can gaming become an addiction?

An addiction is defined as a person's inability to control use of a substance or behavior, despite negative consequences. Some people who are engrossed in screen time or video games while ignoring other normal activities could be close to meeting this definition.

So why does this happen? The reward center in the brain releases dopamine in response to a pleasurable experience or hyperarousal. If a person experiences hyperarousal while playing video games, the brain associates the activity with dopamine. The person develops a strong drive to seek out that same pleasure again and again.

Dopamine is a powerful neurotransmitter in the brain. It helps sustain people's interest and attention, which is why it can hard for people to tear themselves away from a situation or behavior. It's also self-reinforcing. The more times people experience the behavior, the more dopamine is released, and the more driven they are to return to the behavior.

Symptoms of screen time or video game addiction

Similar to tobacco, alcohol or drugs, screen time or video games can become an addiction if it damages your health and relationships, and you are unable to control it.

Some symptoms could include:

• Having intense urges for screen time or to play video games, and these urges block out other thoughts
• Spending money on video games or screens, even though you can't afford it
• Cutting back on social or recreational activities because of preference for screen time or video games
• Continuing to play video games or participate in screen time, even though you know it's causing problems in your life, such as poor performance at school or work, or letting household responsibilities go
• Displaying signs of irritability, anxiety or anger when forced to stop playing, even for brief periods of time
• Lying to others about the extent of your use
• Needing more screen time over time to get the same level of enjoyment
• Neglecting your appearance, including lack of interest in grooming or clothing

Continued excessive use of screens can result in long-term or permanent changes in the brain that require extensive behavioral and medical treatment to reverse.

What can you do?

As your child grows, a one-size-fits-all approach doesn't work as well. Not all kids are the same when it comes to screens and technology. Some children can self-regulate and might even put the screens down to go outside without you prompting them. Other kids become noticeably more anxious and quicker to lose their tempers when they spend a lot of time on screens. You'll need to decide how much media to let your child use each day and what's appropriate.

Consider applying the same rules to your child's real and virtual environments. In both, play with your child, teach kindness, be involved, and know who your child's friends and what your child does with them. Also, keep in mind that the quality of the media your child is exposed to is more important than the type of technology or amount of time spent. Encourage active screen time over passive screen time.

Active screen time is when you are interacting with other people that you know or when you are cognitively or physically engaged. For example, play educational games, or games that require players to build something together. Other options are fitness-type games that require movement while playing. Passive screen time includes watching screens with minimal cognitive engagement, such as scrolling through social media, watching online videos or playing simple games.

Set reasonable limits for your child's screen time and video game types, especially if your child's use of screens hinders involvement in other activities.

Consider these tips:

• Follow guidelines for screen time, such as those suggested by the American Academy of Pediatrics .
• Model healthy use of screens and video games. Consider unplugging when you first get home from work, at dinner and when driving. Model other methods of relaxation and entertainment, such as taking a walk, playing a game, having a dance party or reading a book.
• Encourage a balance between screen time and activities that require in-person social interactions, such as family activities or extracurricular activities.
• Create structured, screen-free times, such as during mealtimes, in the mornings and before bedtime.
• Consider using apps that control the length of time your child can use a device.
• Keep screens out of bedrooms.
• Require that all devices be charged outside of bedrooms at night.
• Learn about the game rating categories and only allow your children to play video games suitable for their ages.

If you're concerned about a child or loved one's use of screen time, consulting a behavioral or addictions specialist can help determine treatment options.

Edward Luker is a counselor in Psychiatry & Psychology in La Crosse , Wisconsin.

Related Posts

10 Negative Effects of Video Games

Video games can be a great recreational hobby. However, video game addiction can lead to several issues. The negative effects of video games include effects on our mind, body relationships, job performance, and more.

It is important to remember that video games are not inherently evil. Most of the negative effects of video games arise from excessive use and addiction. Here are ten negative effects of video games:

• Dopamine addiction
• Reduction in Motivation
• Alexithymia and emotional suppression
• Repetitive stress injuries and other health risks
• Poor mental health
• Relationship issues
• Social disconnection
• Exposure to toxic gaming environments
• Poor academic or professional performance
• Escapism and getting stuck in life

Let’s explore each of these effects in more detail and look at how we can combat the negative effects of video games.

 Learn more about a problematic relationship with gaming by taking the problematic gaming quiz below:

Dopamine Addiction

The reward circuitry in your brain is one of the reasons video games are fun. Your brain releases a neurotransmitter called dopamine, which regulates the feeling of pleasure from video games. When dopamine activity happens in the nucleus accumbens, the pleasure center of your brains, you feel joy.

When you play video games, your brain releases a constant dopamine supply, with occasional random bursts. Over time, your brain gets used to this steady supply of dopamine, and the nucleus accumbens requires even more dopamine release for gaming to feel fun. That prevents you from enjoying anything that is not as stimulating as a video game.

Even if you try to give up gaming, your mind will attract you to other forms of stimulation, such as browsing YouTube or scrolling through social media. Simple activities will seem completely unappealing, and you will not be motivated to do anything that isn’t exciting. That is the height of dopamine addiction. If you let your gaming habit get out of control, this is a real possibility.

Negative Effects of Video Games on Motivation

Unlike the nucleus accumbens, we cannot map the triumph circuit onto the brain as easily. It does not localize to one part of the brain — it’s just a general pattern of psychology and cognition integral to human beings.

The triumph circuit makes us feel good when we overcome a challenge. In evolutionary biology, there’s a strong story about venturing into the unknown, finding something valuable, overcoming some kind of problem, and then bringing it back to society. That has shaped social psychology — we as human beings value people who overcome odds.

Video games have hacked this circuit. They have found a way to deliver all the psychological rewards that we often seek to gain from the real world. What we want from video games is often very similar to what we want from life. We want excitement, adventures, friendships, victories, and status. Games have found a way to serve that to us with little effort on our end. As a result, a person’s ability to engage the triumph circuit suffers when they can just engage it with video games.

Negative Effects of Video Games on Emotions

When we experience fear, worry, shame, or other negative emotions, the amygdala becomes active. The amygdala is the part of that brain that governs these negative emotions. It is also integral to our learning circuitry since it creates connections to the hippocampus, the center for learning in our brain.

However, fMRI studies have shown that if we start to play video games when our amygdala is active, it calms down. The effects of this are two-fold:

• Constant suppression of negative emotions can lead to a condition called alexithymia. If a person is alexithymic, then that means that they have trouble determining their internal emotional state. Alexithymic people find it hard to pinpoint the emotions that they are feeling. However, that does not mean that those emotions do not affect their behavior.
• The amygdala is a core part of our learning circuitry. Painful experiences get imprinted onto our memory, and we learn from them. However, people find it hard to quit playing video games because their amygdala does not make connections with their hippocampus as smoothly. They don’t learn from the painful experiences of not doing well in school or at work. Their learning circuitry gets sabotaged, and it becomes difficult for them to quit gaming.

Negative Health Effects of Video Games

Playing video games is not an unhealthy activity on its own. However, if done for hours on end, it can quickly become detrimental to one’s physical health. Here are some health issues that can arise due to video game addiction.

Repetitive Stress Injuries

Repetitive Stress Injuries (RSIs) are relatively common among gamers. Gaming requires strenuous, repetitive motion on the hands and wrists (sometimes for hours on end). These motions can cause inflammation and injury. Here are some RSIs that you can develop from gaming:

• Gamer’s thumb is a nickname given to a condition called de Quervain’s Tenosynovitis. It is a condition in which the tendons that move our thumb become inflamed, which leads to pain and limited movement.
• Trigger finger, also known as Stenosing Tenosynovitis, is a condition in which a finger gets stuck in a bent position. It may bend or straighten with a snap, like a trigger being pulled or released, hence the name.
• Tennis elbow (Lateral Epicondylitis) is also a potential RSI that you can develop by gaming too much. It is a painful condition in which the tendons in the elbow get overloaded, usually due to repetitive movement of the wrist and arms.
• Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is another RSI that can be caused by gaming too much. Its characteristic symptoms are numbness, tingling, or weakness in the hand. It occurs due to pressure on the median nerve. This nerve runs from your forearm into your hand through a part of your wrist called the carpal tunnel.

Other Physical Health Issues

• We all know the feeling of getting lost for hours in a game, often forgetting to eat, or snacking on unhealthy foods. It should not be a surprise then, that obesity and malnutrition are risk factors from gaming too much. There is also some preliminary evidence that excessively playing video games can lead to obesity in teens.
• Eyestrain is a pervasive issue among gamers. Staring at a screen for hours on end. The eyes focus much differently on a video screen than any other flat surface, such as a notebook. It is less strenuous to stare at a notebook because the distance is constant, and the eyes know where to focus. However, on a video screen, the focus is continually changing, leading to eye fatigue. It becomes difficult for the eyes to focus on other objects, even after the gaming session is over.
• A study done on Australian adolescents found that prolonged periods of sitting at a computer could alter their developing neuromusculoskeletal system. Posture problems are incredibly common among gamers. The body tries to obtain the least energy-demanding position when it finds itself in one spot for prolonged periods. As a result, rounded shoulders, head leaned forward, a curved lower back, and back and neck problems later in life are common among gamers.

Video Games Can Affect the Brain Negatively

Video games do not necessarily lead to mental health problems. However, you can be at high risk for video game addiction if you already suffer from depression, anxiety, or other mental illness. This is due to the way video games affect your brain.

A study that looked at the effect of gaming on mental health found that problematic gaming habits correlated with maladaptive coping strategies, negative emotions, low self-esteem, a preference for solitude, and poor school performance.

While one of the benefits of gaming is an increase in the ability to concentrate, excessive gaming may lead to the opposite. A study done on 3000 children and adolescents from 12 different schools in Singapore found a bidirectional causality in play between video games and attention deficit disorders. While excessive gaming could contribute to a lack of long-term concentration ability, it is also likely that children who already show signs of attention deficit disorders would be more attracted to video games, due to the variety of experiences they can provide.

Relationship Issues

Relationship issues resulting from playing too many video games is a common issue among gamers and their families. When people get too addicted to video games, they start to neglect other parts of their lives. The first parts to go are wholesome and supportive relationships with family, friends, and loved ones.

Relationships need work to maintain. They are like a plant — if you neglect one long enough, it will wither up and die. Relationships need to regular nurturing for them to grow or even maintain. However, when a person spends most of their time playing video games, there is almost no time left in the day to talk to friends and family, let alone pursue romantic relationships.

A healthy amount of gaming with friends and family can lead to stronger bonds. However, excessive gaming often results in isolation. Therefore, it is much more important to keep an eye on your relationships and see if they are moving down a path that you do not desire.

Social Disconnection

Social disconnection is a real problem in the gaming community. Out of all the negative effects of video games, this one is touted a lot. Though we play multiplayer games, we rarely end up connecting with the people in our games. Some communities are more conducive to authentic human interaction than others. However, those are the exception. Isolation can be extremely detrimental to your mental health. Evolution did not design human beings to be solitary creatures. We thrive in groups where can we can support each other.

An Iranian study done on second-grade students in 2009 found that individuals who were addicted to video games tended to have lower social skills than those who were not. Social interaction is a skill, and if you spend most of your time alone in your room, playing games, and not interacting with other people in real life, then that skill will deteriorate. That can lead to social anxiety, which makes the problem worse.

Toxic Environments

In our society, men are culturally only allowed to express one negative emotion: anger. If they express other negative emotions, such as shame or fear, they are seen as weak or overly sensitive. That makes men more susceptible to developing alexithymia, especially if they are addicted to video games.

Statistics on the gender breakdown on the internet say that it consists of about 54% males and 46% females, as of 2019. However, some spaces such as Twitch are male-dominated . That is a lot of people in the gaming community who might feel that anger is the only acceptable emotion they can express. Hence, it is no surprise that these communities are so toxic.

Some gaming communities are more toxic than others. A potential reason for that could be that some games are more competitive than others, and competition sometimes does not bring out the best in us.

Negative Effect of Video Games on Academic Performance

If you are addicted to gaming, then your academic and professional success is likely to suffer. People who play games excessively find it challenging to pay attention to their jobs or school. It is quite common to turn to video games when your performance in these areas suffers. Games turn into an escape when the responsibilities in your life feel overwhelming.

A cross-sectional and longitudinal study of adolescents in secondary school showed a negative association of screen time with school achievement one year later, independent of their physical activity, age, gender, and socio-economic status. It suggests a link between increased gaming and poor academic performance.

You can have a healthy gaming habit and still maintain excellent performance at school or work. But due to the way games affect your brain, it is much easier to lose yourself in the virtual world then to try to tackle hardships in the real world. For example, many children and teenagers start gaming because they find a community that does not judge them for their socio-economic background or physical appearance. They get attached to this community and start to become disinterested in their performance in school, which leads to their grades taking a hit.

Escapism and Being Stuck in Life

We know that video games provide a safe space for people to escape to when they do not feel equipped to deal with the problems in their life. However, sometimes this can become problematic. If video games prevent you from finding ways to deal with your issues, then that is an issue.

If you spend 10 hours a day playing video games, then there is a chance that you are not facing the problems in your life head-on. While it can be quite painful to do so, it is also one of the best ways to move forward. You don’t have to quit video games. You can maintain a healthy balance by taking one step at a time to take back control of your life.

As you might have noticed, most of the negative effects of video games arise from excessive use. Even the health issues mentioned only become a problem when a person spends hours in one place playing video games.

While it may seem like video games can create a lot of problems, there are plenty of gamers that lead successful lives and still play video games. Moderate doses of gaming make all the difference between playing games for enjoyment and gaming controlling your life. If you can address the underlying issues that make you want to play video games for 10+ hours a day, you can take back control of your life.

If you feel that your gaming habit is affecting your life, we can help. Sign up to work with a Healthy Gamer Coach, trained by Dr. Alok Kanojia himself. Healthy Gamer Coaches are gamers who have taken control of their life, and know exactly what you’re going through.

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The Video Games Your Child Plays Has an Effect on Their Behavior

More and more research is emerging with evidence of the negative effects violent video games have on children. The most popular video games are also some of the most violent, and pediatrician Dr. Cindy Gellner speaks about the numerous effects they have on kids. If you notice behavioral problems and other issues with your child, video games with violence and other adult themes may be to blame. Listen to learn about the research and more.

Episode Transcript

With in-person activities for kids on hold a lot during the past year, video games have taken the place of ways for kids to connect while being socially distanced. Is this a good thing? Well, that depends.

Video gaming has become a popular activity for people of all ages since the 1980s. Many kids spend large amounts of time playing them, although the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends kids have more than two hours total of screen time a day. Video gaming is a multi-billion dollar industry, and video games have become very sophisticated and realistic. There are multi-player games, which allow kids to play with their friends across different platforms. However, there's always the possibility that kids can connect with not-so-friendly people out there, too.

While some games have educational content, many of the most popular games emphasize negative themes. They promote the killings in war-like scenarios, sometimes criminal behavior, disrespect for the law and other authority figures, sexual exploitation or violence towards women, racial, sexual and gender stereotypes, and foul language and obscene gestures. Examples of video games not acceptable for children because they have these themes include Grand Theft Auto, Call of Duty, and Mortal Kombat.

There is growing research on the effects of video games on children. Studies of children exposed to violence have shown that they can become immune or numb to violence, imitate the violence they see and show more aggressive behavior with greater exposure to violence. Studies have also shown that the more realistic and repeated the exposure to violence, the greater the impact on children. Kids can become overly involved and even obsessed with video games, which I've been seeing a lot lately, especially in kids who are doing only online learning.

I have parents often asking me how to get their kids off of video games and back onto their classwork. Unfortunately, I don't have any special tricks. But the best thing is to have them do their classwork where you can see them and know what they are doing. Also, check their grades frequently. And if you see a lot of missing assignments, then it's time to limit the video games until school is caught up. Too much video game can lead to poor social skills, time away from family, school work and other hobbies, lower grades, reading less, exercising less, becoming overweight, and having aggressive thoughts and behaviors. I can say that I have definitely seen and heard from parents that decrease grades and increase weight have been directly correlated to kids staying inside and playing video games over the past year.

So how can you, as a parent, protect your child against these types of video games? First, you can check the Entertainment Software Rating Board ratings to learn about the game's content. Every video game will actually have a label on the front to tell you what type of game it is. If it says M for mature, it's not for your child. Our kids have their system set up so they can't purchase a game, even if it's free, without me getting a notification. They're usually pretty good about saying, "Hey Mom, can I get this game so I can play with my friends?" And if it's not one I approve of, they know it's a hard no. We also have it set up in the living room so I know exactly how much time they're playing, what they're playing, and who they're playing with if it's on a group chat.

You can also play the video games with your child to experience the game's content and know exactly what your child is playing. Set clear rules about the game's content for both playing time in and outside of your home. Like if they go to a friend's house. Strongly warn your children about the potential serious dangers of Internet contacts and relationships while playing online. It's sad, but there are a lot of online predators that will look for children specifically playing video games and can lead them into them meeting in real life. Finally, remember that you are a role model for your child. Make sure the video games you play as an adult are ones you would be okay with your child playing.

If you are concerned as a parent that your child is spending too much time playing video games or your child starts becoming obsessed with aggressive or violent video games, make sure you set some limits. Expect some push back because you're going to get it. But kids actually need and want boundaries, and if you set them, eventually they'll surprise you and they'll appreciate that you do monitor them and that you do set limits. I was floored when both of my boys told me that at different times over the past year, that they approved the limits and the monitoring because they know that it's because of what we prioritize in our house and what our family expectations are.

By being aware of what games are out there, who your child is playing with, and what they care playing, and how long they are playing, you can help your child make appropriate decisions about gaming. Video games are a great outlet for some kids, and it helps them connect with their friends when they can't always play in person or when they're older and play dates aren't cool anymore. Most important thing as a parent is to be aware of what your child is doing while gaming and help reinforce positive behaviors and socialization without giving in to excessive gaming time and inappropriate content.

updated: August 9, 2021 originally published: April 6, 2016

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Effects of Video Games Essay

Introduction, school performance, effects on social relationships.

The society has been immensely influenced by the technological changes, which are reshaping some of the activities. The emerging technologies in one way or another have affected every member of society, irrespective of age.

Video Games have had the greatest influence on the lives of children. Children no longer appreciate the outdoor games as was before, as most of their time is spend indoors playing video games.

Although this trend may have a positive impact on the lives of the concerned children as far as their knowledge of computer is concerned, there are various negative impacts.

Various educationists have confirmed that outdoor plays are very important to the development and growth of children.

It helps them develop socially as they meet with their friends and learn to share discussions, get involved in physical activities and develop physically through such games. The paper talks about some of the negative effects of computer games (Finkel, 1995).

It is established through research that computer games do not help children grow academically. In fact, computer games contribute to inactivity of body cells, which might lead to oversight hence causing diseases such as hypertension and diabetes.

Moreover, indoor games contribute to poor academic performance among students because most of the time is spend on useless games that do not offer any academic lessons.

Lastly, computer games lead to the development of antisocial behavior whereby a student is not interested in interacting with his or her peers.

Available literature shows that more children are growing obese owing to the fact that they spend little time exercising and engage frequently with the computer.

Research shows that children who take part in physical exercises are more healthy, intelligent, and active in class. The study conducted by American Heart Association proved that children are contracting heart diseases mainly because of lack of physical activity.

The research indicated that the number of obese children increased by four percent in 1974. Those affected were children aged six to eleven years.

However, the percentage increase could not be compared with the study conducted in 2006 whereby the increase rate was seventeen percent. As from 1971 to 2006, the number of adolescents thought to be obese increased from 6.1 percent to 17.6 percent.

The percentage increase was shocking. Furthermore, the increase was attributed to lack of physical activity and video games (Wiegman, & van Schie, 1998).

Overweight is a costly condition that leads to a number of illnesses among school going children. According to experts at the University of Michigan, obese children have higher risks of contracting diseases such as diabetes, heart diseases, and high blood pressure.

Other illnesses associated with overweight include high cholesterol levels in the body, hyperlipidemia, sleep apnea, respiratory problems, gastrointestinal malfunctions, early adolescence, and finally mental problems.

Studies show that obese children tend to have a low sense of worth and despair.

As AHA records show, obese children are likely to be obese when they attain the adulthood age. This would even cause more problems because they would be exposed to a number of diseases.

A study conducted by Media Literacy Clearinghouse indicated that children had developed a habit towards computer games. Video games had gained relevance among children aged eight and eighteen years to an extent that the rate at which children played computer games rose from an average of 26 minutes in 1999 to 73 minutes in 2009.

Generally, the rate at which children interacted with the computer daily rose from six hours in 1999 to seven hours in 2009. A report compiled in 2004 at the University Hospital of Zurich revealed that a strong link between obesity and video games exist.

It can be concluded that video games do not help children in any way but instead it affects their health. Video games interfere with the children’s eating habits because such children would tend to consume food with high calories.

In this regard, parents need to monitor the behavior of their children as regards to physical fitness.

In the United States, a study conducted to ascertain the effects of computer games on the performance of students proved that PlayStations and other video games such as Xbox Video affects the concentration of children in class.

Furthermore, the study revealed that children who are like using playing video games could not compete favorably with those who prefer physical games. One of the researchers was quoted saying that the performance of students who engage in physical exercises will always improve with time.

Boys are affected more by the new trend since they would rarely improve in class. Their performance would always remain stagnant for a period.

Moreover, boys cannot develop skills that would help them to read and write well in case they are allowed to interact with the computer frequently (Sakurai, 1984).

It should be noted that video games might not necessarily cause poor performance among school going children but the time spent in watching the games or playing them would consume the time that a student would be expected to read, do some homework, and write a good composition.

Definitely, a student would register a poor grade in case he or she does not engage in a serious research. Video games have a tendency of instilling negative reading attitudes to students. This is because a student would find reading a storybook or solving a mathematics problem boring.

Video games are very fast and demand a higher concentration unlike other academic activities that need time for conceptualization. In a joint study conducted in Australia, researchers concluded that video games affect the performance of students in many ways.

Students who spend time playing video games would always perform dismally in class. In fact, the study revealed that computer games do not help children perform well in any of the subjects. This is because students who spend time watching and playing computer games would always score low in each subject.

This research contradicts some of the assumptions that computer games help children to perform well in some subjects. The Australian study revealed that there is no single positive correlation between academic performance and computer games.

Video games are known to influence the cognitive and educational dexterities of children. Moreover, the games can as well as define the children’s social relationships. In a traditional setting, the relationship between the child and the parent or other senior members of society is clearly defined.

The video games have changed meaning that social relations are no longer the same. Studies indicate that video games, especially those that are violent, reshape the behavior of children. Moreover, video games could contain some sort of competition and aggression, which affect the reasoning of children.

In the current society, the rate at which conflicts occur in society has increased. Youths are currently violent because of the new games. The main objective of video games, according to Nintendo and Sega Genesis Center, is violence.

Any game played by children via the computer does not have anything new other than violent content. The companies specializing in selling computer games would convince parents that the games are non-violent but in the real sense, they are not.

A study conducted in 1998 confirmed that many children, over 80%, were familiar to a violent game referred to as Duke Nukem. Unfortunately, only 5% of parents were aware of the game meaning that children are access even those games that are supposed to be accessed by only the adults.

This trend affects the social life of children. In 1999, students at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado engaged in a destructive demonstration mainly because of the influence of computer games.

Students shot at their fellow teens and other people because they experienced it through video games. Such kind of behavior is destructive because it could lead to social anomy (Griffith, 1999).

Studies across the world indicate that violent video games increase an individual’s hostility and aggression. Aggressive games would lead to a habit whereby students prefer to play the games rather than engage in physical exercises.

This is even related to overweight. Children who are used to video games tend to be indifferent and unresponsive to the sufferings of other children. They would easily bully their fellow students without mercy.

Finkel, S. (1995). Causal analysis with panel data. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Griffith, M. (1999). Violent video games and aggression: A review of the literature. Aggression and Violent Behavior , 4(2), 203-212.

Sakurai, S. (1984). Construction of the Social Desirability Scale for Children. Japanese Journal of Educational Psychology , 32(2), 310-314.

Wiegman, O., & van Schie, E. (1998). Video game playing and its relations with aggressive and pro-social behavior. British Journal of Social Psychology , 37(2), 367- 378.

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Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Effects of Video Games." December 8, 2019. https://ivypanda.com/essays/effects-of-video-games/.

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Living Better

Worried about your kids' video gaming here's how to help them set healthy limits.

Yuki Noguchi

I grew up in the 1980s and '90s with parents who strictly controlled my "screen time," which almost exclusively meant TV back then, as well as a pocket game that died when I was 10 and was never replaced. Like many in my generation, I absorbed a general sense that video games, like TV, were frivolous brain rot.

Now, my two boys, ages 12 and 13, are growing up in a digital world in a way I did not. Their generation lives online, spending more hours in virtual spaces since the pandemic began.

I'm lucky: My sons are hardworking and kind to their chronically frazzled single mother. They make raising them as easy and joyful as adolescence could possibly allow.

But still, our house rules about video games are arbitrary and our disputes over them constant. No amount of yelling "No games on school nights!" or "Not before dinner!" has worked, or inspired them to learn a new skill instead.

I feel like I'm flying blind when it comes to regulating their game use and I know I'm not alone. Many parents worry that they should be doing more to limit online play.

Shots - Health News

Want to understand your adolescent get to know their brain.

But as I learned from talking to numerous experts — psychologists, game designers and researchers — the impact of video games is more nuanced than that of other kinds of screen time, like social media. In fact, some research shows it can have positive effects, like promoting problem solving, or teamwork and communication.

Here are these experts' insights and advice for how to optimize the upsides of gaming and protect kids from potential hazards.

Video games are different from other screen time in crucial ways — and have some benefits

"Screen time" is an outdated concept. Kids study, play video games, use social media and watch videos on screens, but those do not all have the same developmental impact. Video games, in fact, do not show the kind of negative behavioral or emotional effects researchers correlate with social media use, says Kelli Dunlap , a clinical psychologist and community director for Take This, a mental health advocacy group within the gaming community.

"Research has shown again and again and again, time spent playing video games is not predictive of mental health outcomes," she says.

One reason for the difference in impact may be that social media is primarily about marketing, or comparing oneself to others, while gaming is generally about socializing with friends, solving a puzzle, or engaging in competition.

In fact, Dunlap says, parents often overlook some benefits of games: "They're a tool. You can use games to improve your social connection, to practice feeling emotions we normally avoid, like guilt or grief or shame. A lot of games bring those feelings out in us, and they give us a space to play with those feelings."

Games that involve joint projects like a battle or a quest can help develop useful social skills, says Peter Etchells, a research psychologist at Bath Spa University in the U.K. "It requires very kind of precise team-building," he says. "It requires thinking about timings and placement and good communication skills to coordinate with people. It's doing that kind of coordinated work that's really useful for all sorts of things."

Teens say social media is stressing them out. Here's how to help them

Help kids prioritize offline activities so gaming doesn't subsume them.

Children need some limits on their gaming, especially if it begins to crowd out other essential or healthy activities, many experts warn, like schoolwork and sleep in particular.

"Screen time is a hard thing to quantify," says Michael Rich, a pediatrician and director of the Center on Media and Child Health at Boston Children's Hospital. "What is easier to quantify — and probably more in line with what is developmentally optimal — is quantifying non-screen time."

He advises parents to watch that family meals, chores, and outdoor or in-person play do not get subsumed into game time.

Kids also benefit from having periods of lower stimulation, away from technology, Rich says. "I want to bring back boredom," Rich argues, because that can also lead to imaginative play.

You need to start gaming with your kids

Every expert I spoke with recommended playing video games with your child to figure out what might specifically be motivating them to play — the needs the game might fill for them.

Online chess, for example, is a different experience than a multiplayer game with friends. Shy children might find it easier to socialize in games. Another child might regard it as stress relief. Some children may use games as a place to escape or process a difficult situation.

Boston Children's Rich says most things parents worry about with games — stranger danger, violence, sexuality — can be addressed by simply exploring the game through their eyes.

Join The Game

Best games of 2022 chosen by npr.

"What's happening is that you are saying, 'I love you, I respect you, I want to understand what is engaging you here,'" says Rich. "You're entering that space with a very different stance, that of essentially the student. You will get a sense for what the game is."

If you've noticed your kids yell, scream or cry about something that happened in a game, don't be disturbed, experts say. A child's reactions to emotions and interpersonal dynamics are real, even if the play itself takes place virtually, or on a device. Experts say outbursts during game play do not mean your child is more likely to act violently in real life.

Video games are like other spaces where your kids spend time. Ask yourself: Is it safe? Who else is there?

Games are social spaces — good or bad things can happen there — just as in real life. Think about the games your kids play as just another kind of space where you're letting them hang out, several experts suggested.

For example: If you have a 5-year-old, you wouldn't drop your child off alone at a mall, where strangers might approach. Now you might drop off your teen at the mall, but not before discussing who they're hanging out with, what they plan to do, and perhaps an agreement about when to come home for dinner. The same general principles can apply to teens who game.

Parents should ask themselves: Does the game culture itself seem conducive to age-appropriate behavior? Games with female characters with exaggerated sexual features, for example, might subject a child to sexual harassment.

If you don't like what you're seeing in a game, remember that outright bans and restrictions tend to backfire with adolescents. It's more vital to keep communication lines open, says Dunlap and other experts, so if something bad happens within the game, you can help them process or deal with it.

Watch for "dark designs" or designs that fuel nonstop playing

Be on the watch for certain "dark patterns" or "dark designs" in games, say several gaming experts. These terms refer to software or algorithms written to elicit certain negative behaviors in their users.

One of the most common is in-game purchases that can border on extortion, says Max Birk, an industrial-design researcher at Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands. "It's important because it changes what the emphasis of the game designers is," he says.

Games fueled by in-game purchases (as opposed to games you buy up front, like NBA2K or Dance Dance Revolution) tend to have a financial stake in keeping children engaged for long periods of time. These games make it very easy to start a new game, or create steep incentives to keep players coming back.

Birk suggests talking to your kids about the game structure and directing them toward games that are more about story lines, or that have natural ending points that can allow the kid to wind down game play on their own.

Monitor games for toxic culture and harassment

Toxic culture and comments can thrive in certain games because parents are not monitoring those spaces. That often takes the form of harassment of female gamers. The onus is on parents of boys, especially, to make sure that they treat people equitably online, and to stand up against any sexist or misogynistic talk, says Jesse Fox, a communications professor at Ohio State University.

Remind your kids that rules about respectful behavior apply online as they do in life. "Gaming culture and gaming norms are going to imprint on their idea of normal behavior, what's acceptable behavior," Fox says. That's why it is critical for parents to monitor that play space — listen to conversations, keep the screen within public view.

Find the spaces that are safer and more inclusive by design. Fortnite, Fox notes, is an example of a game that has a huge diversity of characters in game, because it's trying to appeal to a very broad audience. That diversity makes it harder to distinguish players by race or gender.

Watch for these gaming red flags

For many children, gaming can be positive, but it's a good idea to keep an eye out for these signs of problematic game use.

Excessive spending in games: The game's financial incentives might be to keep your child engaged and encourage — even try to coerce — their characters into spending money to advance. Teach your child to recognize these kinds of tactics and redirect them to games where the game itself is the primary focus.

Negative reactions or anxiety over gaming friends: If your kid is repeatedly having big emotional reactions to the game, check in and figure out what elements of the game are so upsetting. Then redirect them to games and spaces that don't have these elements. Find single-player games to take a break from social dynamics.

Too little sleep: If your child is playing late into the night or turning up groggy in the morning, their game use might be out of hand. Make sure the child cannot access games all night long. Often, it's not the desire to play the game itself, but the social pressure to not miss out on experiences with friends that will keep them online, U.K. researcher Peter Etchells says. So shut down other technology as well, preferably well before bedtime.

• video games
• teen mental health
• video games for kids

What Are the Pros and Cons of Video Games?

Video games have become one of the world’s favorite pastimes. There are almost  3 billion gamers  worldwide in 2021, with gaming prevalence continuing to grow every year.

Gaming is not without controversy, though. Critics of video games will stress that the cons of video games outweigh the pros, while those who support video games will say the opposite.

Objectively, there can be positive effects of video games when played in moderation. However, there can also be negative effects when played excessively.

It’s best to look at the pros and cons of video games through your personal experience and remember that the  key is  gaming in moderation .

Pros of Gaming

Although research is still ongoing on the pros and cons of video games, some studies thus far have shown the following benefits when an individual plays video games:

• Improved cognitive functions
• Problem-solving skills and the use of logic
• Hand-to-eye coordination
• Faster and more accurate decision-making
• Improved eye for details
• Social activity and teamwork

These pros of video games might help you with tasks that you do every day, but they might also be applicable for jobs where you require a great deal of attention and concentration, such as working as a surgeon, driver, or programmer.

On the surface, these pros of video games look appealing. Still, it’s important to remember that these positive effects of video games come with a catch:  they can be far outweighed by the cons if gaming becomes an addiction.

These are the pros of gaming. You can read our full article about the  positive effects of video games  here.

Games Improve Cognitive Functions

Video games have shown to improve your cognitive abilities , such as:

• Visuospatial ability (the ability to recognize objects around you and estimate the distances between them)
• Increased processing speed
• Deductive reasoning
• Mathematical intelligence

For example, a  study from 2018  included 170 participants. In the study, one group was made up of gamers, while the other group was non-gamers.

Both groups received the same questionnaire with questions and assignments that would test their cognitive abilities. The group of gamers showed better results in almost every field of the test.

Games Improve Problem-Solving Skills and Logic

Video games involve a lot of critical thinking, problem-solving, and the use of logic. 

As a gamer, you have to work your way through the game by using specific skills to achieve the game’s goals.

Gamers have  more grey matter and better brain connectivity  than non-gamers, resulting from extensive playtime requiring problem-solving skills.

Developing these skills in video games may translate into better job performance or improved performance in school .

Improved Hand-to-Eye Coordination

Playing video games improves your hand-to-eye coordination, making you more capable of performing tasks that involve coordination of your eyes and your hands.

These tasks can include everything from everyday tasks such as driving, typing, or performing manual tasks with your hands to professional skills like performing surgeries.

These improvements were confirmed by a  study from 2007 , which involved laparoscopic surgery trainees that also played video games. The study found that surgeons who played video games regularly had higher accuracy and could complete tasks faster than non-gamers. 

Faster and More Accurate Decision-Making

Another pro of gaming is the ability to make more accurate decisions in a much quicker fashion.

Players of video games will tell you that several games prompt you to make your decisions quickly based on the information you receive from the game itself.  Fast-paced games , in particular, contributed to a gamer’s ability to make quick decisions.

Some games, especially competitive ones where you play against other players, can be punishing if you make a wrong decision. For example, the game Call of Duty involves fast-paced action, and you need to make the right decisions at the right time to win.

Again, this skill can be crucial in several fields of work, such as in the army or in the hospital, where you need to make fast and accurate decisions based on the facts and information you have, especially when you have limited time.

You See More Detail

Video games and eyesight quality is still a hotly debated topic. Some studies tell us that excessive screen time causes eyestrain and might even hurt your eyes. In contrast,   other studies  show us that video games can improve your ability to see details in your sight, especially in your periphery.

Studies  that show excessive screen time is harmful find you may experience negative effects such as eye strain, headaches, loss of focus flexibility, nearsightedness, and even retinal damage.

On the other hand, playing video games might improve your ability to see more details in your eyesight, especially in your periphery. This development of your eyes might help you drive better and perform various tasks that include driving.

It’s essential to stay within the  recommended screen time guidelines for all ages  since too much screen time may cause damage to your eyes. However, if you play games in moderation, you might even be able to see some positive effects on your eyesight.

Games Promote Social Activity and Teamwork

Video games can promote teamwork and social engagement with other players, making it a modern form of socialization for kids and young adults.

Some games can force you to cooperate with other players, making video games a beneficial exercise for  team-building  and establishing social connections with other players.

Also, several games present the opportunity to make new friends and connect to them in ways that no other medium does, including the chance to meet people from all over the world.

However, excessive playtime can lead to increased isolation and loneliness , which are linked to mental health problems like depression and social anxiety . Although gaming is a social outlet for many individuals, and making new friends from different cultures is possible, a balance of in-game contacts and real-life friendships is crucial.

Cons of Video Games

Despite several benefits of playing video games, there are also many disadvantages of video games that might impact the quality of your life.

These are the most common cons of video games:

• Video games can make you addicted
• Elevated risk of aggression
• Games replace real-world problems
• Some games promote gambling
• Decreased physical and mental health
• Lack of focus and concentration

As good as the positive effects of games might be, the  negative effects of video games  can outweigh the pros if you develop a gaming addiction. 

Video Games Can Make You Addicted

The first and the biggest problem with video games is that they can make you addicted .

Video game addiction  is a rising problem and likely to increase in the future. The World Health Organization has recognized gaming disorder as an actual mental health condition, and global prevalence is around  3-4% of gamers . Considering that there are about 3 billion gamers globally,  the number of addicted gamers  is estimated to be between 90 – 100 million.

One of the main reasons behind the pandemic of video game addiction is that  video games are designed to be addictive . They provide instant gratification and encourage gamers to keep playing every day. Players who play every day may even receive bonuses and special rewards in encouraging them to play even more.

But the concept of addictive video games is even more complicated. They manipulate several aspects of our psychology, such as:

• Progression of our in-game character, which replaces real-life personal development
• Loot boxes, microtransactions, and in-app purchases encourage you to keep spending more money 
• Socializing virtually with other players replaces real-world friendships and connections
• In-game mechanics that  link gaming to gambling

Once a video game becomes an addiction, it will far outweigh all the pros of video games. It will impact your professional life, personal development, and interpersonal relations.

If you feel like you or someone you know is addicted to video games, feel free to try some of the programs and resources we have on Game Quitters:

• Respawn program for gamers
• Reclaim program for families
• Find a video game addiction therapist near you
• If you’re a therapist and want professional training, consider  INTENTA’s training
• Join our  community forum  and read our  blog

Elevated Risk of Aggression

Several studies ( 1 ,  2 ,  3 ) have shown that video games are a risk factor behind aggression. 

However, the studies also found that video games are not the only factor behind this aggression. Video games might increase the risk of aggression in an individual in combination with other factors.

There’s also a stigma around video games promoted by the media, which says that video games are violent and promote violence. But it’s far too easy to pin this problem down solely to video games, although they can be a contributing factor.

Although  the link between video games and violence  is still hotly contested, many parents report increased aggression in their children when playing excessively, including damaging property. Therefore, parents should be mindful to ensure their children play age-appropriate games and seek professional support if they experience increasingly aggressive behavior.

Games Can Replace Real-World Problems

One of the main problems with playing video games too much is that they neglect other key areas of one’s life, such as one’s personal or professional life.

It’s a safe place to fail, and it presents an easy way to  escape real-world problems . Although escaping from stress is not necessarily bad, the problem occurs when gamers start to neglect other critical aspects of their real life.

When that happens, it might be time to consider limiting your playtime, replacing it with other activities, and dealing with your life problems.

Some Games Promote Gambling

Modern video games are linked to gambling through loot boxes and microtransactions that promote compulsive spending.

Gamers who suffer from gaming addiction can also  develop a gambling addiction , exacerbated by the seeming ease of access to gambling-like mechanics inside modern games. Many of these games are played by kids, meaning that children have access to gambling mechanics using real-life money. Parents report discovering hundreds or even thousands of dollars spent on their credit cards without their knowledge.

Gamers Can Develop Physical or Mental Health Issues

Excessive game time can lead to physical and mental health issues, which include:

• Depression and social anxiety
• Lack of motivation
• Poor emotional regulation
• Poor sleep hygiene
• Muscle loss and fat gain
• Dehydration

It’s important to take a closer look if you develop any of these symptoms; you may want to consider  video game addiction therapy  if you do.

Lack of Concentration

Spending a long time in front of a screen playing games can impact a gamer’s ability to focus and  concentrate  on other tasks such as school, work, college, or study.

Games demand a lot of attention to detail and concentration. But, unfortunately, we’re only able to focus for a certain amount of time daily, and the more time you spend gaming, the less attention you will have for other tasks.

The pros and cons of video games are interlinked and will differ from one gamer to another. There are some positive benefits of games when played in moderation. However, there are also negative effects if played excessively.

You should always be aware of the cons of games, and if you notice the first signs of these cons developing, you should consider moderating your gaming or seek help to prevent further problems with gaming addiction.

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11 Advantages and Disadvantages of Video Games

Often based on fantasy, they also reflect both history and current events. But whether it’s a good or bad thing is up for debate. Even though video games are a household name today, they were born in the research labs of scientists.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Video Games

It all started in 1952 when British professor A.S. Douglas created OXO, better known as tic-tac-toe at the University of Cambridge. Then Spacewar! came out in 1962, which was the first video game that could be played on multiple computer installations.

In 1972, Atari introduced Pong, the first truly successful commercial arcade video game. Since then, video games have evolved from arcade systems to home consoles, handheld consoles, and mobile devices. Today, video games make up a massive $100 billion global industry.

Video games are often at the forefront of computer technology and they have been a part of our culture since the past few decades . But let’s face it, they have their share of Pros and Cons. Let’s take a further look at the pros and cons of video games.

Advantages of Video Games

Even though video games are demonized by most non-players, many scientists and psychologists find that video games can have many benefits. Some of them are explained below.

1. Improved Vision

Studies suggest that video game players may get an unexpected benefit from them; better vision. They have been shown to increase players’ ability to distinguish subtle differences in shades of gray.

They may also help players increase their ability to visually detect the direction of movement. It was found that gamers spotted targets on a cluttered screen 80% of the time, while non-gamers managed this only 30% of the time.

2. Brain Booster

Playing video games directly impacts regions of the brain responsible for memory, spatial orientation, information organizations, and fine motor skills. As people age, the importance of playing games tends to increase.

It could improve decision-making skills; compared to non-players, gamers who spend time daily with fast-paced games can react to questions or situations up to 25% faster.

3. Improved Life Skills

Video games involve taking risks, and the ability to strategize. It teaches patience, perseverance, and the right judgment. It also helps people find new friends and social connections. Besides, gamers become better at critical analysis and learn to concentrate on tasks at hand to completion.

4. May Ease Anxiety and Depression

It has been found that people are more confident, energetic and emotionally positive when they play video games, which is exactly the opposite of what depression brings about.

People who feel depressed lack physical energy, find it difficult to carry out daily tasks and are generally pessimistic. Thus, playing can reduce the risks for depression, help with arthritis, and even be a therapeutic option for aphasia.

5. Painkiller

According to a study from the American Pain Society, video games, and more specifically 3D ones, could help reduce the brain’s response to physical pain.

Playing an attention-grabbing video game may distract one away from a painful activity and help them with chronic pain conditions, especially children.

Disadvantages of Video Games

Video games can teach us high-level thinking skills, but too much of anything can be bad. Some consequences of playing these games are listed below.

1. Addiction

Video games are designed to be addictive, so it is essential to have some self-control. Especially people with poor impulse control or who have a hard time fitting in are most vulnerable to game addiction.

It could be because people tend to play games to fill the void that real-world problems leave behind. It is better to watch out for this form of addiction because it might eventually end up costing you a lot.

2. Social Replacement

Video games often act as a replacement for real-time human connections. People who find themselves playing hours upon hours of video games may find themselves losing touch with the relationships they’ve built with other people.

People argue that with internet -connected games, they can easily hang out with friends and families without ever leaving home, but this type of virtual get together is no replacement for actual face-to-face interaction.

New studies show that the risk of being overweight increases with every hour people spend on virtual play. Lack of motion and overplaying lead to muscle pain as well. Moreover, the addiction to these games leads to sleep deprivation which contributes to obesity.

Video game addiction could lead to other levels of psychological stress as well. Gamers may suffer from low self-esteem, have social anxieties, or even suffer from depression.

Excessive gaming can also inspire feelings of guilt and shame. It is possible that uncontrolled gaming could enhance the signs and symptoms of other mental disorders.

5. Could Limit Academic Process

Although video games can improve the strategic thinking decision-making process, they can also deteriorate them.

Students who use their free time to play video games can struggle to keep up with school/college. Most gamers have been seen to procrastinate on their studying, or they simply ignore a deadline just to play their favorite game.

6. Violence

Often, children playing violent video games depict a lack of self-control and an increase in emotional arousal. While violent video games could have different effects on different people, they are all concerning. So, it is better to choose games you feel are appropriate for both you and your children.

To Conclude

Video games aren’t bad for you as long as you aren’t overdoing. So, enjoy your downtime and relax with your games but get out there and keep your life as diverse as possible as well, because eventually, you have got to win the game of life.

• history.com
• dl.acm.org 
• www.cnet.com
• ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
• readersdigest.com.au

I am Ila Adhikari from Chauni, Kathmandu. I’m currently pursuing my Bachelors Degree in Computer Engineering from Kathmandu Engineering College, Kathmandu. I’m also a fellow at Women Leaders in Technology. I enjoy reading, gardening and doing cool DIYs. I have worked as a tech content writer for eSatya, a blockchain initiative in Nepal in the past. At present, I’m working on a blockchain based research project. As time flies, I want to listen to my heart in doing what I love and continue learning new stuff.

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Five damaging myths about video games – let’s shoot 'em up

Does video gaming really breed antisocial behaviour and isolation? On the contrary…

V ideo games are one of the most misunderstood forms of entertainment. In one sense, it’s easy to see why: if you haven’t had much interaction with them, watching someone play one can be a pretty unsettling experience. Gamers can often give the impression that they’re glued to the screen, absorbed in what feels like the digital equivalent of junk food. At best, it seems like a pointless thing to do; at worst, we worry that games are socially isolating, or actively harmful. If we take a little time to uncover the true nature of video games, though, we find a very different story playing out…

1. ‘Video games cause us to become more violent’

One of the longest-standing tropes about video games is that violent ones – like Call of Duty or Fortnite – can cause players to become more aggressive in the real world. It’s a worry that becomes acutely salient in the context of mass shootings. Video games often take centre stage in the ensuing media analysis of such atrocities, with insinuations that not only do the perpetrators play violent games, but that they were driven to the act because they play games.

Such accusations often fall flat in the face of subsequent forensic analysis. Indeed current scientific evidence suggests that the link between games and aggression is actually weak. In a recent study published in Molecular Psychiatry participants were asked to play a violent game ( Grand Theft Auto V ), a non-violent game ( The Sims 3 ) or no game at all, every day for a period of two months. Using an array of questionnaires and behavioural measures to test aggression, sexist attitudes and mental health issues, the study’s authors found that playing the violent video game had no significant negative effects on any of these measures.

In a similar vein, research published this year in Royal Society Open Science showed that in a survey of more than 2,000 teenagers and carers in the UK, there was no evidence that playing violent games caused the teens to either become more aggressive or less social.

Two studies aren’t going to give us the whole story, of course, but the emerging picture from the research literature is that video games don’t appear to have a meaningful impact on aggressive behaviour, and certainly aren’t the root cause of mass acts of societal violence.

2. ‘Video games are addictive’

In the summer of 2018, the World Health Organization formally included “gaming disorder” in its diagnostic manual, the International Classification of Diseases , for the first time. It was a decision that ignited a furious debate in the academic community. One group of scholars argued that such a diagnostic label will provide greater access to treatment and financial help for those experiencing genuine harm from playing video games. Others (myself included) argued that the decision was premature ; that the scientific evidence for gaming addiction simply wasn’t accurate or meaningful enough (yet).

Part of the problem lies in the checklists used to determine whether a disorder exists. Historically, the criteria for gaming addiction were derived from those used for other sorts of addiction. While that might be a reasonable place to start, it might not tell us the whole story about what the unique aspects of gaming addiction look like. For example, one of the standard criteria is that people become preoccupied with games, or start playing them exclusively, instead of engaging in other hobbies. However, these don’t sit very well as a benchmark for what you might consider to be “harmful” engagement, because games themselves (unlike abused drugs, say) are not inherently harmful.

Also, using this as a criterion has the potential to inflate the prevalence of addiction. While there will be people out there for whom gaming can become problematic, the chances are that this is a small group.

Moreover, some research suggests that gaming addiction is fairly short-lived. Data looking at players over a six-month period has shown that of those who initially exhibited the diagnostic criteria for addiction, none met the threshold at the end of the study.

This is not to say there isn’t anything about games to be worried about. Increasingly, and particularly in the case of mobile games, gambling-like mechanisms in the form of in-app purchases and loot boxes are being used as sources of income. Here, some emerging research suggests a correlation between people who spend money purchasing loot boxes to acquire new in-game items and scores on measures of problematic gambling. This work is preliminary, and we don’t yet know the causal direction of the relationship, but it points to the fact that there are some aspects of games marketing and monetisation that we need to be wary of.

3. ‘Gaming leads to social isolation’

The stereotypical view of a gamer is a pasty white teenager playing alone in his or her bedroom. It’s understandable that something about that situation seems unhealthy or unnatural. But this view usually comes from a misunderstanding of what video games really are. Games , since their inception, have been designed as social experiences. Whereas in the first 30 or so years of their existence this was restricted to people playing multiplayer games with each other in person, the advent of high-speed, ubiquitous internet access means increasingly that those interactions are moving online. Rather than isolating people, online gaming has the potential to bring us together in myriad new ways, to form close-knit communities based around common interests and hobbies.

Take Mats Steen, for example. Mats was born with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a devastating disease that causes progressive muscle deterioration. As he grew up, to the outside world – to his family, even – he appeared to become isolated and withdrawn. After he died in 2014 at the age of 25, a different picture emerged – one in which Mats lived a full and happy life in the online world of Azeroth, the setting for Blizzard’s long-running game World of Warcraft . Far from being alone, Mats was surrounded by friends in this world, and they clubbed together to travel to Norway for his funeral.

For Mats, like so many other people around the world, the value in playing video games was not just in their ability to help him escape, but in their ability to help us connect with each other.

4. ‘It’s a meaningless waste of time’

I often get this criticism as a games researcher – couldn’t I be doing something better with my time? There’s a certain dissonance to the notion, in a way: somehow, we are able simultaneously to worry that games are the root cause of many of society’s problems, yet also consider them to be a pointless or vacuous thing to do. Why play them when you could go outside, or engage in more culturally enriching forms of art? But this comes from a misunderstanding about the creative power that games possess. They provide us with an opportunity to experience our world and other fantastical places in a way no other form of media comes close to.

As novelist and games designer Naomi Alderman outlined in a 2013 radio essay : “While all art forms can elicit powerful emotions, only games can make their audience feel the emotion of agency. A novel can make you feel sad, but only a game can make you feel guilty for your actions.”

Video games place you at the centre of the story – you are an active participant, instead of a passive observer. They offer us a safe place to interrogate and test the emotional consequences of our actions. Far from being a meaningless waste of time, then, games help us explore what it means to be human, to explore notions of love and loss, and to allow us to travel to far-off incredible places, to become incredible people – all from the comfort of our own home.

5. ‘It’s purely entertainment’

Video games, obviously, were a product of scientific development. Increasingly, that relationship is becoming symbiotic – in part because of their power to draw us in, video games are being leveraged in the course of scientific study. The best examples of this achieve two things: they act as fertile ground for collecting scientific data, while at the same time being an entertaining game experience.

An example of this is the recent mobile game Sea Hero Quest . Developed in 2016, Sea Hero Quest is a living, breathing virtual laboratory where the game acts as an experiment. Players are tasked with memorising a map, and then navigating a cartoonish fishing boat around a series of waterways, visiting a set of buoys in a specific order. That data is being used by scientists at University College London and the University of East Anglia to understand how spatial navigation abilities vary across the globe, and across the lifespan.

This sort of knowledge is crucial in developing a deeper understanding of how such abilities start to decline and go wrong in the case of neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s disease. Within six months of launch, the game had been downloaded by nearly 4 million people from every country in the world, and the hope is that in the future, data from the game will help inform new approaches towards diagnosing and treating dementia.

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Essays About Video Games: Top 12 Examples and Prompts

Video games have revolutionized the way we have fun today. If you are writing essays about video games, check out our guide to inspire your writing.  

Few can contest the fact that video games have taken over the world. From the basic, almost “primitive” games of the 1970s like Pong to the mind-bending virtual reality games of the 2020s, they have been a source of entertainment for all. Moreover, they have proven quite profitable; countries like Japan and the United States have made tens of billions of dollars solely from the video game market.

Despite their popularity, much has been debated over the potentially harmful side effects that video games may have, particularly on children. One side argues that playing certain video games can lead to people exhibiting violence in the future, while others believe that video games teach players essential life skills. Regardless, they will continue to be a part of our lives for the foreseeable future. 

For engaging essays about video games, read the essay examples featured below for inspiration.

1. What electronic games can teach us by Kendall Powell

2. designers are imagining video games without guns by keith stuart, 3. playing video games all summer won’t make you feel worse by nicole wetsman, 4.  violent video games bad by andrea newman.

• 5. ​​The health effects of too much gaming by Peter Grinspoon

Writing Prompts For Essays About Video Games

1. video games: good or bad, 2. the benefits of video games, 3. what is your favorite video game, 4. do video games cause people to become violent, 5. video games in your life, 6. video games vs. traditional games, 7. is the video game rating system enough.

“In other studies, researchers found that gamers who trained on Tetris were better at mentally rotating two-dimensional shapes than those who played a control game. Students who played two hours of All You Can E.T., an educational game designed to enhance the executive function of switching between tasks, improved their focus-shifting skills compared with students who played a word search game.”

Powell explains a few possibilities of applying video games to education. As it turns out, certain video games can improve players’ skills, depending on the mechanics. Researchers are inspired by this and hope to take advantage of the competitive, motivational nature of gaming to encourage children to learn. New games are designed to help kids improve their focus, coordination, and resilience, and game designers hope they will succeed. 

“Imagine a game where you’re a war reporter seeking to capture the most iconic, representative images in a battle environment: You’d still get the sense of peril that audiences expect from action adventures, but your relationship with the environment would be more profound. It would be Call of Duty from the perspective of a creative participant rather than a violent interloper.”

The graphic nature of some video games is said to make kids violent, so it is only natural that some creators try to change this. Stuart writes that it is possible to maintain the fun that shooter-type games induce without using guns. He gives examples of games where you do not kill your enemy, simply stunning or capturing them instead. He also suggests photography as an alternative to killing in a “shooting” game. Finally, he suggests basing video games around helping others, making friends, and doing more peaceful, creative tasks.

“Any role video games play in skewing well-being that did pop up in the study was too small to have a real-world impact on how people feel, the authors said. People would have to play games for 10 more hours per day than their baseline to notice changes in their well-being, the study found.”

Wetsman counters the widespread belief that video games “destroy your brain.” Research done with a sample of 39,000 players over six weeks has shown that whether one plays video games for long or short periods, their mental health is not impacted much. There are some exceptions; however, there are not enough to conclude that video games are, in fact, harmful.

“Some people believe that the connection between violent games, and real violence is also fairly intuitive. In playing the games kids are likely to become desensitized to gory images;which could make them less disturbing, and perhaps easier to deal with in real life. While video games aren’t about violence their capacity to teach can be a good thing.”

In her essay, Newman writes about the supposed promotion of violence in some video games. However, she believes this violence does not cause people to be more aggressive later. Instead, she believes these games expose children to certain atrocities so they will not be traumatized if they see them in real life. In addition, these games supposedly promote connections and friendships. Finally, Newman believes that these “harmful” can make you a better person.

5. ​​ The health effects of too much gaming by Peter Grinspoon

“Gamers need to be educated on how to protect their thumbs, wrists, and elbows, their waistlines, their emotional state, their sleep, and their eyes. Simple education around taking breaks, stretching, eating healthy snacks, and resting and icing your thumb, wrist, or elbow when it starts hurting can address injuries early, before they become significant. For the eyes, gamers can try the 20-20-20 rule: every 20 minutes, try to look at something 20 feet away for 20 seconds.”

Grinspoon discusses both the benefits and the health risks of gaming. Video games allow people to interact with each other remotely and bond over specific missions or tasks, and some research shows that they have cognitive benefits. However, some gamers may develop vision problems and hand and wrist injuries. Gaming and “staring in front of a screen the whole day” is also associated with obesity. Overall, Grinspoon believes that gaming is best done in moderation.

Looking for more? Check out these essays about hobbies .

Many parents believe that their children’s “bad behavior” is because of video games. Based on your experience and others, decide: are video games good or bad for you? Make sure to read viewpoints from both sides and write an essay based on your position. Would you encourage others to play video games? Discuss these pros and cons for an interesting argumentative essay.

Like anything else, video games have both positive and negative aspects. Explain the good that video games can do for you: the skills they can equip you with, the lessons they can teach, and anything else. Also, include whether you believe their benefits outweigh the disadvantages they may pose. 

For your essay, write about your favorite video game and why you chose it. What is its meaning to you, and how has it affected your life? Describe the gameplay mechanics, characters, storyline, and general impact on the gaming community or society. You can write about any game you want, even if you have not played it; just ensure the content is sufficient.

Many claim that playing violent video games can make you violent in the future. Research this phenomenon and conclude whether it is true or not. Is the evidence sufficient? There are many resources on this topic; support your argument by citing credible sources, such as news articles, statistics, and scientific research.

Video games have been a part of almost all our lives. Recall a treasured experience with video games and explain why it is significant. How old were you? Why do you remember it fondly? How did this experience make you feel? Answer these questions in your own words for an exciting essay.

There are stark differences between video and traditional games, such as board games and card games. For an engaging essay, compare and contrast them and write about which is more entertaining, in your opinion. Be creative; this should be based on your own opinions and ideas.

The video game content rating system is used to classify video games based on their appropriateness for specific ages. However, parents complain that they are not strict enough and allow the display of violent content to children. Explore the criteria behind the rating system, decide whether it needs to be changed or not, and give examples to support your argument.

If you are interested in learning more, check out our essay writing tips !

Tip: If writing an essay sounds like a lot of work, simplify it. Write a simple 5 paragraph essay instead.

Martin is an avid writer specializing in editing and proofreading. He also enjoys literary analysis and writing about food and travel.

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Essay: Advantages and disadvantages of video games

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Pros of playing Video Games (Advantages)

1. of course video games are fun, 2. promotes problem solving skills, logical and quick thinking.

A lot of video games require the player to solve a puzzle or other problems in a short amount of time without loosing accuracy. This helps the development of his ability of problem solving and logical thinking, which can be used in real life.

3. Improves hand-eye coordination

In most video games, the player is holding a controller and watching the screen, he then acts as fast as he possibly can according to what is happening on the screen. In shooting games, the character may be running and shooting at the same time. This requires the player to keep track of the position of the character, where it is heading, its speed, where the gun is aiming, if the gunfire is hitting the enemy, and so on. All these factors need to be taken into account, and then the player must then coordinate the brain’s interpretation and reaction with the movement in his hands and fingertips. This process requires a great deal of eye-hand coordination, and in some cases, it even improves reflexes.

4. Opportunity for multitasking and managing multiple objectives

In strategy games, for instance, while developing a city, an unexpected surprise like an enemy might emerge. This forces the player to be flexible and quickly change tactics or rethink his goals.

5. Increases social interaction

Multiplayer video games improve teamwork, cooperation, and could be a great way for social interaction. While players need to act as a team to win the game, they need to communicate with each other in order to win. This type of teamwork can be used in real life to improve team work.

6. Opportunity for planning and resource management

Video games teach the player to make management decisions and manage the effective use of limited resources. Also, the player decides the best use of resources, the same way as in real life.

7. Promotes situational awareness

A lot of strategy games require the player to become mindful of sudden situational changes in the game and adapt accordingly.

Defense News reported that the Army include video games to train soldiers to improve their situational awareness in combat.

8. Develops reading and math skills

The player reads to get instructions, follow storylines, and gather information from the game texts. Also, using math skills is important to win in many games. such as games that involves quantitative analysis like managing resources.

9. Encourages perseverance

In a game, the player usually fails the first time around, but he keeps on trying until he wins and then moves on to the next level.

10. Develops inductive reasoning and hypothesis testing

A player in an action game must constantly try out combinations of weapons and powers to use to defeat an enemy. If one does not work, he changes hypothesis and try the next one. So the player tests out several solutions to achieve his goal in the game.

11. Could be a good source of energy

When playing the Nintendo Wii, you can actually get a reasonable physical workout playing it! Games like Wii Fit or Just Dance require physical activity and have workout/sweat modes.

12. Could turn into a career.

A career in Video Game Testing could be a dream job, giving one access to the newest, cutting edge video games in production.

Cons of playing Video Games (Disadvantages)

1. can become addictive.

There is a big level of addictiveness in certain video games. People who are unable to deal with their problems might just resort to go to video games in order to escape their problems. It might be rare and uncommon, but some players have actually lost their jobs and lives over video games. In some severe and rare cases, players died because they did not stop playing to go eat or sleep.

2. Promotes violence

• Most of the bad effects of video games come from the violence they contain. people who play more violent video games are more likely to have aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. They also could become immune to it, more inclined to act violently themselves, and are less likely to behave emphatically.
• The player is in control of the violence and experiences the violence in his own eyes (killings, kicking, stabbing and shooting). In many games, the player is rewarded for being more violent. This active participation, repetition and reward are effective tools for learning behavior.
• The American Psychological Association (APA) also concluded that there is a “consistent correlation” between violent game use and aggression, but finds insufficient evidence to link violent video play to criminal violence.

3. Promotes poor health

Video games may also have bad effects on some children’s health, including obesity, video-induced seizures. and postural, muscular and skeletal disorders, such as tendonitis, nerve compression, carpal tunnel syndrome.

4. Some video games teach kids the wrong values.

Violent behavior and aggression are rewarded. Which is not the case in the real-world. Also, when playing online, the player can pick up bad language and behavior from other people, and may be vulnerable to online dangers.

5. Games can confuse reality and fantasy.

6. affects academic achievement.

Depending on the over-all time spent playing video games, many game players would skip their homework to play games. This could affect their performance in school and would result in poor school grades.

Recommendations for Video Games

Because of the popularity of video games, completely eliminating them from a child’s life might be difficult. However, a parent can decrease the negative impact that they have by following a few tips:

• Parents can best protect their children by remaining engaged with them to better understand the content, how they react, and providing limits and guidance as necessary
• Video consoles and computers should be placed in common areas of the home, rather than in children’s bedrooms.
• Set limits on the amount of time youths can play these games.
• Encourage participation in sports or school activities in which youths can interact with peers in person rather than online.
• Know the rating of the video games your child plays.
• Supervising a child’s Internet use as there are now many “video games” available for playing online.
• Take the time to discuss with a child the games he is playing or other media he is watching.

The ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) looks at a number of factors when rating games, Similar to the movie industry’s rating system. In particular, it considers the amount of violence, sex, controversial language, and substance abuse found in a game. Based on its developed guidelines, it then gives an age recommendation and content descriptor to each game submitted.

The following are the rating symbols currently in use, according to the ESRB Web site.

Early Childhood (EC)

Content is intended for young children.

Everyone (E)

Content is generally suitable for all ages. May contain minimal cartoon, fantasy or mild violence and/or infrequent use of mild language.

Content is generally suitable for ages 13 and up. May contain violence, suggestive themes, crude humor, minimal blood, simulated gambling and/or infrequent use of strong language.

Content is generally suitable for ages 17 and up. May contain intense violence, blood and gore, sexual content and/or strong language.

Adults Only (AO)

Content suitable only for adults ages 18 and up. May include prolonged scenes of intense violence, graphic sexual content and/or gambling with real currency.

Rating Pending (RP)

Not yet assigned a final ESRB rating. Appears only in advertising, marketing and promotional materials related to a “boxed” video game that is expected to carry an ESRB rating, and should be replaced by a game’s rating once it has been assigned.

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Home — Essay Samples — Entertainment — Video Games — Advantages and Disadvantages of Video Games

Advantages and Disadvantages of Video Games

• Categories: Video Games Violence in Video Games

About this sample

Words: 2086 |

11 min read

Published: Jan 8, 2020

Words: 2086 | Pages: 5 | 11 min read

Table of contents

Shifting paradigm of play, bibliography.

• Reading, Richard. "The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent–child Bonds." Child: Care, Health and Development33, no. 6 (2007): 807-08.
• Maccoby, Eleanor E. "Parenting and Its Effects on Children: On Reading and Misreading Behavior Genetics." Annual Review of Psychology51, no. 1 (2000): 1-27.
• Hembree-Kigin, Toni L., and Cheryl Bodiford Mcneil. "Foundations for Parent—Child Interaction Therapy." Parent—Child Interaction Therapy, 1995, 1-13.
• Yelland, N. Early Childhood Education Journal (1999) 26: 217. Gehlbach, Roger D. "Children's Play and Self-Education." Curriculum Inquiry 16, no. 2 (1986): 203-13.
• Uhlmann, Eric, and Jane Swanson. "Exposure to Violent Video Games Increases Automatic Aggressiveness." Journal of Adolescence, February 2004.
• Blumenthal-Barby, J S. "Psychiatry's New Manual (DSM-5): Ethical and Conceptual Dimensions." Journal of Medical Ethics40, no. 8 (2014): 531-36.
• Mitchell, Alice, and Carol Savill-Smith. The Use of Computer and Video Games for Learning: A Review of the Literature. London: Learning and Skills Development Agency, 2004.

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By Anna Marks

Opinion Staff Editor

On Monday night, a select group of celebrities and fashion designers mounted the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, presenting a litany of costumes for the public to devour. The Met Gala is an annual spectacle of celebrity that raises money for the museum’s Costume Institute , which works to preserve fashion history.

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