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Introduction
The advent of digital technology has come with mixed reactions from society due to the unknown impact it has had on the community. The advent of digital media is critical in advancing negative impact on the society like pornography on the internet or identity theft. Lately, the media has increased the amount of violence it exposes especially via movies and games. Computers and video games are particularly very influential in the context hence this paper discusses the impact these media have had on the society especially the children. Researchers have argued that there is increased violence in the media especially television and computer games and this is influencing negatively on the children. The children are vulnerable because of their innocence, level of curiosity and that they have a lot of time to spend on watching TV or in front of a computer (Anderson, 2002. 103). Outcomes from studies are that children face adverse influence of violence mainly through video games (Anderson, 2002. 103). They hence become desensitized, aggressive, anti-social and susceptible to violent behaviour or event serious crimes. Rather than being a form of entertainment, TV and computer games have become increasingly violent and this violence is having bad influence on society (Anderson, 2002. 103). This paper discusses the impact (causing violence) video games have on society because it forms the market for the video produced in the industry.
Increasing Aggression in TV and Computer Games
Many of the games sold today featuring kicks, punches, shooting, weeping and murders as the main episodes. This is in an effort by player to try to defeat the opponent. This violence is usually inanimate objects and fantasy creatures though some may contain humans (Anderson & Bushman, 2002, p.237). Many of the games now include some elements of violence in order to sell including the Tomb raider that is characterized by fights or Killer 7, which has many violent scenes among others. A parents group against TV violence carried out a research that indicated that about 70% of all the games sold in UK contained extreme levels of violence (Anderson & Bushman, 2002, p.2377). Furthermore, as the computer and TV game technology gets more sophisticated, the graphics used for creating these games are being refined to create very brutal and actual violent scenes. Scary effects including Mortal Kombart are typical examples of such violent games. The major question of concern is why there is increased violence in computer games. The simple answer has been that violence in such thrilling games is very saleable (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p.773). The NECs Vice president revealed that the violent games attracted more people and in fact, many of them were willing to spend even more money on these games (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p.773). Many teenagers and children say that they greatly enjoy violent games. The British society appears as craving for violence (Anderson & Bushman, 2002, p.2377). The TV industry has seen a close to 90% increase in programs that contained violence and this has influence what kind of games are produced since many of them are based on TV programs that the users will be familiar with. Producers are currently producing games that are more violent because it is almost obvious that many clients will purchase and play violent games than those that do not have any action theme.
The Impact of Violence on Society
The explosion of computer games in the past few years has lead to the question about its content and the impact on the society. Many of these games as indicated contain very gross violence (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p.773). The newest generation technology is presenting games that are even more real that it is very hard to differentiate them from mere simulations.
Aggression
The most feared impact that these games are likely to have on the society is the evoking aggression. This terminology is quite general and refers to a wider number of individual characteristics. Connor and colleagues defined two categories of violence that were very distinct (Connor et al, 2004, p. 130). They are reactive aggression where the person gets angry and so self-protective against a threat or out of suffering some kind of frustration. This type of aggression characterizes the behaviour of a person who seriously seeks revenge against another person who did something wrong to him/her (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p.775). This type of violence is very common in games as a theme where the starring characters seek revenge and when they attain it, they turn out as heroes. It can have a very big impact on the people who play such games, as their minds tend to associate such characteristics with superiority or being very good traits to achieve in real life (Connor et al, 2004, p. 130).
The second type of aggression is the proactive violence. This type of aggression is a deliberately choice of character but much of its manifestation relates to reinforcement by external forces like video games (Connor et al, 2004, p. 130). A typical example is armed robbery to get some cash. The games that are being played daily on modern versions are among the many that are having a very big influence on the whole society ranging from young children to very old adults (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p.778). As living gets tougher due to economic problems, work or school, many people suffer some kind of stresses and frustrations. At the same time, different people deal with these conditions differently. When action is taken against this stress and frustration, its done in violence or anger and the consequences can be very grave either physically or emotionally (Irwin & Gross, 1995, p. 338). Direct influence of games in this includes sarcasm, faulting and fighting. Research by Irwin and Gross (1995, p. 338) revealed that those boys who played violent games acted more aggressive than those who played non-violent games. More evidence indicates that impetuous traits among children follow prolonged exposure to violent video games.
Kirshs study exposed students to violent and non-violent games (Kirsh, 2003, p. 377). In half of the questions asked, the boys who played violent games responded with forceful reactions in their suggestions. Since the group under non-violent video showed no significant behavioural response to violent questions, we can deduce that this indicates that the society was very vulnerable to the violent games (Kirsh, 2003, p. 379).
Manhunt for instance, is a very violent game where the player approaches the enemies by stalking them and murdering them in delight. The killings are made bloodier cunning and horrific. The game has three levels of execution. These killing get bloodier as the enemy progresses as level two can be described as gory while level three is over the top death. These levels are coded white (green); yellow the red to indicate seriousness. For instance when in level one, a player just strangles the opponent (this is minor), in level two, the player strangles the opponent while hitting him of the head. The third level is grosser and the player struggles, punches the opponent and bends the enemies head as he groans in pain and suffocates slowly to death by lack of oxygen. Many users criticised this type of forcible resistance, claimed it cannot, and should not be rationalised. If these scenes infiltrate the minds of children, it has the potential of turning them to criminals
Impact on Childrens Development
General observations indicate that most of the things that children experience in their active development in younger years usually has a great impact on their future lives. Parents usually want the best thing for their children and try as much as possible to offer the best parenting. They provide what children want including games, schooling and shelter. Over 70% of games that are play on Computers or the television are show high degree of violence (Connor et al, 2004, p. 130). It is my belief that violence instigates more violence. Research also supports this perception. It is very easy to observe that children and young adults who present hostile behaviour tend to indulge in violence against their peers and they lack remorse for what they inflict on others. According to Kirshs study, violent video game addiction has a similar effect on children especially in the absence of guiding adults. From such games, promote faulty thinking which translates to stressors that present several signs in children (Connor et al, 2004, p. 130). Children are very vulnerable since their brains are actively developing and they are at a learning stage where they integrates anything that is praised by the society or presented by the media as good to be unquestioningly good (Connor et al, 2004, p. 130). In the same sense, children who get influenced present signs of hostility, weird emotional reactions and actions that are imitations of what they learn form the TV and computer games. Several researchers have shown children trying out stunts that they see in the games that they play (Kirsh, 2003, p. 375). When violence is very common in society, children think it is a normal behaviour. Such thoughts can be very hard to change in future (Anderson, 2002. 103). The Columbine incident where children extensively exposed to violent games caused a lot of violence at home (Brener, 2002, p.148). Carneal Michael a very young student killed his peers by gunshots because he was a fanatic of such violent games.
Rape and Sexual Problem
Current research about psychology of development has shown that the electronic media has a very big influence on the emotions, character an attitude of individuals (Anderson, 2002. 103).Exposure to violent video games greatly influences the behaviour people addicted to such games. Anderson et al (2002) has shown that over-exposure to violence is directly related to the increased aggression, feeling of enmity, thoughts about brutality including carnality (Anderson, 2002. 103). Because of bad influence, violence demonstrates as a way of dealing with conflicts. Since most of the violent scenes in games will indicate stars as heroes when they escape punishment, children and young people believe that violence can effectively solve issues of disagreement. When people are unable to solve their problems, they develop hate attitude that tend to influence their character. (Anderson, 2002, p.103). Research also shows that sexualized violence has increased considerably due to influence from media. The games that imply violence against women are very bad for the society (Gentile et al, 2004, p. 22). This is because they create the anti-women attitude and such individuals accept the rape myth. These ideas have been very evident in many researches about interactive TV and PC games that indicated that the most popular games contained very aggressive scenes and vicious content (Gentile et al, 2004, p. 22). To make matters worse, these violent games reward and glamorize gross sexual behaviour. Grand Theft Auto is such an example. Very grisly presented humour creates sexual aggression against women and this includes things like massacre, rape and assault. Basically from the learning theory, practicing, repetition and rewarding violent acts could be more conducive to heightening aggression among young adults that its has previously been perceived. With better games that incorporate virtual realities, the concern about violence is of great concern (Gentile et al, 2004, p. 22). Such interactive media intensifies learning aggressive violence that passively implied in watching films.
Antisocial Character
Professor Murray in his research concluded that the most plausible explanation of the anti-social character was like to observe that there was a tendency to like violent programs on television by young people (Dill & Dill, 2004, p. 78). Such tendencies are likely to breed aggression as the young people grow. This way they tend to seclude themselves and hence start showing symptoms of being antisocial (Anderson, 2002. 108). There is opposition to this conclusion claiming that they lack basis of any significant data. For any work to be accepted as research evidence, Funk and colleagues claim that it has to be extensive, excellently conceived, scientifically adequate, nonbiased, thorough, and honest. This therefore means that more studies about the matter must aim at providing adequate evidence (Funk, et al, 2003, p. 267). However, a different study in Norway where 20 boys were involved in violent gaming, it revealed that the real world exposure to violence together with PC games led to excess of aggressive behaviour (Gentile et al, 2004, p. 22). The students in such case would therefore create a way of identifying themselves as secluded and turn out to be antisocial. Further studies by Gentile show that there is generally a positive correlation between early childhood and puberty exposure to violence (violent games) and antisocial character in future. The origins of the behaviour present some kind of a learnt trait linked to playing violent games (Gentile et al, 2004, p. 22).
Violent TV and PC Games Do Not Really Cause Violence
Violent computer games have faced a lot of opposition from parents but still they continue to find market and increased production. The reason of concern is that, despite the negative impacts associated with such games, many people still buy them anyway. Probably, the simple answer is that the TV games violence or aggressive video games do not cause real life violence anyway. Many people believe that even younger children understand that whatever is on TV or Computer screens is not a reflection of the real life situation but mere fantasy (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p.773). Furthermore, with proper parenting, children may require to understand that they need to and should not try to imitate what is on the computer games as these are not the same rules that apply in true world. Violence and fantasy will always interact, as they are part of the society that expressed through fiction (Funk, et al, 2003, p. 267). There is little possibility that television and computer games could replicate mass murder. However, there is also the need to appreciate the fact that they could as well inspire those watching them to commit these heinous acts. The fact that real objects used in these games occur in real life situations, people may just relate the actions practiced on TV and other screen when availed with the real weapons. Since all actions begin as concepts in the mind, people addicted to playing violent video games could experience change in mental perception about real life and begin to play act violent actions even with the simplest weapons such as hockey sticks and knives, which are readily available. Furthermore, proponents of games argue that unlike weapons games are not instruments. These games cannot also instigate human intentions to real life but rather are paltry reflection of true happenings in real world and tender consolation and comfort just a form of entertainment displaying event in virtual world (Dill & Dill, 2004, p. 78).
Conclusion
One amongst the many positive impacts that digital technology has had on society is the ability to access information in real time. Nonetheless, digital technology has also led to an increase in television and games violence, and cause those electronic games bring several issues especially negatively impact on current society, such as childrens development, aggression, rape and sexual problem, and antisocial character issue.
For instance, children are vulnerable because of their innocence, level of curiosity and that they have a lot of time to spend on watching TV or in front of a computer (Anderson, 2002. 103). Most of the games that in the market today feature kicks, punches, shooting, weeping and murders as the main interesting episodes. The explosion of computer games in the past few years has lead to the question about its content and the impact on the society. As a result, many of these games as indicated contain very gross violence and aggression. This violence has also indicated impacts on the development of children. Watching violence computer and video games has a behavioural correlation seen in increased incidences of rape and murder cases amongst teenagers. This has resulted in an increasingly number of young people embracing.
From these observations, the deductions that screen games cause violence and aggression in real life situation follows undoubtedly. The extent of TV and PC games related aggression vary from one society to another. In all these situations, the effect yields high aggression in warlike society and relatively low extent in societies with strict measures on violence and crime. Sociologists also observe change in behaviour of young people toward violence due to addiction to violent video games
Reference List
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