Don’t panic if he’s probably just describing a session playing a brand new video game, Grand Theft Auto IV. Like its predecessors, the brand new Grand Theft Auto is full of raw subject matter: It features graphic violence, profanity, and sexual topics, place against the background of a city that resembles New York almost exactly.
Even though the game is not intended for kids under the age of 17, chances are that your children or their friends won’t have any trouble obtaining a copy.
Some parents don’t have any issue with their kids playing violent games, since they trust them to be aware of the difference between reality and fantasy, and they’re glad to know where their kids are and what they are doing. Others view violent games as nothing more than murder simulators that desensitize children to real-life pain and suffering. You may find yourself wondering:
Are violent video games really bad for kids? And how can I find out about the kinds of games my children want to play with?
Be Conscious of Possible Effects
Despite many studies, the impact of violent media on kids is difficult to pin down – not least because such a impact is bound to vary from 1 individual to another. A recent analysis by UK-based researcher reasoned that even trying to determine whether a game could be good or bad for many children may not be asking the correct question:
The exact same content may be helpful to your child at a certain point in their life and development and may be equally detrimental to another child. That means focusing on the child, what we know about how children’s brains develop, how they understand and how they change as they develop.
This isn’t simple – although we can try to categorize kids by age and gender there are vast individual differences which can impact on a child’s experience when gaming or online, especially the wider context in which they have developed and in which they experience the technology.
Video games promote experimentation within a set of rules that may not always be clearly defined in the beginning. Section of playing a game is figuring out exactly what its specific bounds are. Furthermore, unlike books or movies, the experience of playing a video game is dictated in large part by the decisions the player makes.
In the event of something like Grand Theft Auto, many of the gameplay possibilities that appear so dreadful are optional, and are actually punished within the context of the game when the police start to chase the character.
Nevertheless, there is no wonder that a lot of folks do play mainly for the opportunity to engage in simulated unlawful action, without any any real time consequences. And while no conclusive studies exist to establish any kind of long-term effect on children who play these games, many respectable trials have shown that playing games will temporarily increase one’s aggression level . If video games lead to temper tantrums or even fights in your house, then you may have a difficulty.