Dr. Craig Anderson: Violent Video Games and Aggression
Dr. Craig Anderson from the University of Iowa is one of the most frequently cited and published researchers in the field of video game violence. Anderson’s work has been used in a variety of venues from scholarly publications to State Supreme Court arguments. Anderson research was used in the Illinois video game legislation defense where he was described as, “The nation’s pre-eminent researcher on the effect of exposure to violent video games.” Anderson’s work has been published in a multiple books, from Children in the Digital Age: Influences of Electronic Media on Development (2002) to his own Violent Video Games Effects on Children and Adolescents: Theory, Research and Public Policy (2006).
Violent Video Game Effects on Children and Adolescents Theory, Research, and Public Policy (Oxford University Press, 2006)
by Craig A. Anderson, Douglas A. Gentile and Katherine E. Buckley
Description
Violent video games are successfully marketed to and easily obtained by children and adolescents. Even the U.S. government distributes one such game, America’s Army, through both the internet and its recruiting offices. Is there any scientific evidence to support the claims that violent games contribute to aggressive and violent behavior?
Anderson, Gentile, and Buckley first present an overview of empirical research on the effects of violent video games, and then add to this literature three new studies that fill the most important gaps. They update the traditional General Aggression Model to focus on both developmental processes and how media-violence exposure can increase the likelihood of aggressive and violent behavior in both short- and long-term contexts. Violent Video Game Effects on Children and Adolescents also reviews the history of these games’ explosive growth, and explores the public policy options for controlling their distribution. Anderson et al. describe the reaction of the games industry to scientific findings that exposure to violent video games and other forms of media violence constitutes a significant risk factor for later aggressive and violent behavior. They argue that society should begin a more productive debate about whether to reduce the high rates of exposure to media violence, and delineate the public policy options that are likely be most effective.
Violent Computer Games and Youth Crime. Is there a link?
The NZ Herald reports: “Violent Xbox video games are being fingered by a top police officer as a possible cause of rising violence among young people.
“Superintendent Bill Harrison, national manager of police youth services, says youth violence rates have jumped in the past two or three years throughout the Western world, coinciding with the rise of new products such as the Xbox.”
See full story: Video violence beyond a game: top cop
Wednesday November 28, 2007. By Simon Collins
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10478781&ref=rss
Society Raises Concerns Over Dissemination of Objectionable Internet Content
Media Release 13/08/07
On Thursday night last week The Australian Prime Minister John Howard announced a A$189 million package to deal with the growing problems of internet porn and dissemination of, and availability of, objectionable content to minors via Internet Service Providers (ISPs). The tough measures adopted by the Howard government to stamp out two evils – accessibility to hardcore porn and alcohol abuse in Northern Aboriginal communities – because of their injurious effect on the “public good” and links to child abuse, has been matched by his latest measures. Every Australian public library as well as individual family will be provided with free software to filter internet content to prevent children downloading pornography and other offensive material, service providers will work alongside the government to filter pornography at its source, a ‘black list’ of pornographic sites will be established, and privacy laws will be altered so that sex offenders cannot ‘hide’ on the internet and chatroom sex predators will be rigorously hunted down and prosecuted. In addition a seven-day-a-week hotline will help parents put filters on their computers to block material that is passed on to home computers via ISPs.