Violence and Video Games

Violence and Videogames

Dr. Laura Stockdale seeks to investigate the effects that violence in media, particularly in videogames, have on the levels of empathy in frequent vs. nonfrequent players. Her study measures implicit attention to emotion, which is measured by P100 and N200/P300 brain activity. High P100 amplitudes indicate significant attention to others’ facial expressions, revealing possible correlation to empathy. The N200/P300 brain levels reveal the amount of neural resources activated when faced with affective distractors (like the facial expressions of others). Dr. Stockdale hypothesized that frequent gamers would have low P100 levels and N200/P300 brain levels.

Dr. Stockdale’s hypotheses proved correct in that low P100 levels were observed, indicating a lack of empathy from frequent videogame players towards happy facial expressions. Also, low amplitudes were observed in the N200/P300 measurements of constant gamers, which reveal almost an anesthetic to neural networks required to indicate empathy. Yet, it leads one to question what is the generalizability of this test into the real world? I personally play many first-person shooter games on nearly a daily basis and still consider myself a very empathetic person. It seems pretty frequent to hear of video games being detrimental to those who play it, yet what about studies indicating possible benefits?

            Dr. Emiliano Santarnecchi, a former Counter-Strike (first-person shooter videogame) fanatic, is now the assistant professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School, and he seeks to show proof of the benefits first person shooter games have on the cognition of frequent video gamers. He created a longitudinal study where participants would receive an MRI scan before playing Counter strike and then immediately after. After 3 months, the scans indicated thickness in specific areas like the sensory cortex, parahippocampal place area, and our left lingual gyrus, which basically means the strengthening of areas of the brain responsible for proprioception and decision making. He even conducted a study with three groups of surgeons over five weeks to test how videogames can increase their performance on a surgery simulator. The group that played the first-person shooter game performed the best on the test.

            It appears that much research still needs to be done to test the total effect videogames have on their fans. Dr. Stockdale definitely sheds light on the effect videogames have in dulling our emotions, yet could confounding variables like cultural and sociological factors also play a role in this research? For instance, Japan is a video gamer paradise but has one of the lowest crime rates in the world, while the United States is engulfed with gun violence, so I believe the issue could be attributed more so to sociological factors.

References

Pinchefsky, Carol. “Video Games May Enhance Skills Beyond a Superb Double Jump.”

BrainFacts.org, 6 Feb. 2019, www.brainfacts.org/neuroscience-in-society/tech-and-the-brain/2019/video-games-may-enhance-skills-beyong-a-superb-double-jump-020619.

Stockdale, Laura A., et al. “Emotionally Anesthetized: Media Violence Induces Neural Changes

during Emotional Face Processing.” Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, vol.

10, no. 10, Sept. 2015, pp. 1373–1382., doi:10.1093/scan/nsv025.

Online Article: https://www.brainfacts.org/neuroscience-in-society/tech-and-the-brain/2019/video-games-may-enhance-skills-beyond-a-superb-double-jump-020619

Dr. Stockdale’s Article: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/hdluh1vfs2cphhz/AADh1d3KFXR-ZhKBCLY9-dSba/(04.21.20)%20-%20Laura%20Stockdale?dl=0&preview=Stockdale_etal_2017_SCAN.pdf&subfolder_nav_tracking=1