A joint study conducted by researchers in Texas working with the Centre for European Economic Research has turned up some interesting results on the effects of violent video games.
The researchers found two opposing effects through their investigation on the relationship between violent video games and violent crimes. Firstly, they found that their research supports behavioural psychology studies that find a correlation between violent video games and aggressive behaviour.
Secondly, the study suggests that video games (either violent or non-violent) offer a ‘voluntary incapacitation effect’ or ‘time use effect’ that keeps violent people who might otherwise engage in criminal activities occupied with violently tea-bagging their latest Halo victim.
The full study, Understanding the Effects of Violent Video Games on Violent Crime, contains all sorts of complicated equations, logarithmic equations on game violence and its effect on sales, citations on data sources, analysis of methodology and other complicated scientific research stuff. The gist of it all is summarised in the abridged conclusion below:
“Regulation of the video game industry is usually predicated on the notion that the industry has large and negative social costs through games‟ effect on aggression. Many researchers have argued that these games may also have caused extreme violence, such as school shootings, because laboratory evidence has found an abundance of evidence linking gameplay to aggression. Yet few studies before this one had examined the impact of these games on crime. We find that the social costs of violent video games may be considerably lower, or even non-existent, once one incorporates the time use effect into analysis.”
“These analyses are suggestive of the hypothesis that violent video games, like all video games, paradoxically may reduce violence while increasing the aggressiveness of individuals by simply shifting these individuals out of alternative activities where crime is more likely to occur. Insofar as our findings suggest that the operating mechanism by which violent gameplay causes crime to fall is the gameplay itself, and not the violence, then regulations should be carefully designed so as to avoid inadvertently reducing the time intensity, or the appeal, of video games.”
It is also interesting to take a look at the graphs below, taken from the report, which show a correlation between the yearly holiday released of violent video games and a reduction in crime rates. The data used is taken from the United states National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS), a federal data collection program begun by the Bureau of Justice Statistics in 1991 for gathering and distributing detailed information on criminal incidents for participating jurisdictions and agencies.
The BBC also recently published a report looking in to causes for a sharp drop in Us crime rates. Among the 10s reason suggested was the report discussed above.
The other nine reasons for a reduction in US crime rates were: The inspirational Obama effect; fall in demand for crack cocaine; better, smarter policing; clever statistical analysis leading to reaction to pinpointed crime hotspots; increase in legal abortion in the 70’s lead to less poverty stricken young adults; reduction in exposure to lead in petrol, which has been shown to cause behavioural problems; the ‘baby boomer’ generation has moved out of the ‘criminal age’ bracket; and the proliferation of camera phones is a deterrent.
Looking at the graph above, one can see the sharp decline in US murder rates beginning in 1991. The early 1990’s was a period of innovation of video gaming and marked the evolution of the pastime into a mainstream form of entertainment. Home PCs featured ever more powerful processors and 3D graphics cards were introduced to the market. Home consoles moved from the 16-bit era of SNES and Sega Mega Drive to 32- and 64-bit Nintendo 64, PlayStation 1 and Sega Saturn.
Coincidence?
Video games help to reduce crime rates << Comments and views
Source: Understanding the Effects of Violent Video Games on Violent Crime
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