The Effects of First-Person-Shooter Video Games on Adolescents. Jake Fletcher. Texas Tech University

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1 Running head: FPS VIDEO GAMES AND ADOLESCENTS 1 The Effects of First-Person-Shooter Video Games on Adolescents Jake Fletcher Texas Tech University

2 FPS VIDEO GAMES AND ADOLESCENTS 2 Video games are enjoyed by millions of people, specifically adolescents, every day because they allow the user to partake in and control a virtual reality. Since the creation of video games, companies have competed with one another to produce games that deliver a more realistic experience. This recent increase in realism has led to the development of very violent first-person-shooter video games. Adolescents who excessively play first-person-shooter video games can develop negative physiological and emotional effects. A study conducted by Christopher Barlett, Richard Harris, & Rose Baldassaro, researchers at Kansas State University, sought to provide support for the idea that violent firstperson-shooter video games increase the aggression and hostility levels of adolescents. Primarily, the researchers set out to prove a correlation between playing violent first-personshooter video games and the negative emotional effects it has on the young players. Barlett, Harris, and Baldasaro (2007) believe this recent increase in video game technology allows the users to become more immersed into the violent virtual reality of first-person-shooter games. This new level of immersion demands a greater emotional investment from the players and therefore needs to be monitored (Barlett et al., 2007). In order to test this idea, the researches monitored the heartrate, aggression, emotional state, and blood pressure of ninety-nine college students as they played a violent first-personshooter video game (Barlett et al., 2007). The researchers found that the students state of aggression, arousal, and hostility rose noticeably throughout the duration of the experiment (Barlett et al., 2007). The results were even higher for the students who played for a longer amount of time or used a realistic firearm controller (Barlett et al., 2007). In conclusion, the research shows a direct relationship between the violence of first-person-shooter video games and the increased levels of physical aggression of the adolescent players (Barlett et al., 2007).

3 FPS VIDEO GAMES AND ADOLESCENTS 3 The second study focuses on comparing the different levels of aggression experienced by adolescents and adults while playing a first-person-shooter video game (Breuer, Harris, & Quandt, 2014). The researchers understand that there is an astounding amount of research about the effects of violent video games on children; however, rarely do these studies compare their results to that of older players (Breuer et al., 2014). The importance of this study is to test how the violence in first-person-shooter video games effects the aggression of children more harshly than that of adults (Breuer et al., 2014). Specifically, the researches focused on recording the different levels of physical aggression, anger, and verbal aggression experienced by players of different ages groups (Breuer et al., 2014, p.186). The researches selected a group of five-thousand participants ages fourteen to eighty-nine in order to test this idea (Breuer et al., 2014). The participants were split into three different age groups; ages fourteen to eighteen, nineteen to thirty-nine, and forty or older (Breuer et al., 2014). The participants were then given a survey discussing their video game usage, their self-efficacy, and the way they would respond in potentially violent situations (Breuer et al., 2014). Overall, the researchers discovered that the adolescent participants showed the highest physical aggression scores, the strongest preference for the action and FPS genres, and the most intense video game use in general (Breuer et al,. 2014, p ). Though the researchers were pleased with their results, they admit that they were unable to find a direct relationship between verbal aggression and a preference for violent video games (Breuer et al., 2014). The final study tests the effects of overexposure to violent first-person-shooter games on the brain stimuli of adolescents (Montag, Weber, Trautner, Newport, Markett, Walter, Felten, & Reuter, 2012). The researchers set out to confirm that first-person-shooter video games can lead to a lower level of stimuli response towards negative emotional experiences in young gamers

4 FPS VIDEO GAMES AND ADOLESCENTS 4 (Montag et al., 2012). Many previous studies display the effects of violent games on the emotions of children; however, this study is intended to show how the violent video games physically change the way their brains operate (Montag et al., 2012). The importance of this study is to prove that the violent video games can negatively alter the way players act in real life (Montag et al., 2012). The researchers began their study by recruiting a group of forty young males in which nearly half of them had experience in playing first-person-shooter video games (Montag et al., 2014). The participants were then shown several sequences of emotional images, such as relaxing nature scenes, erotic images of women, and violent screenshots from a first-shoot video game (Montag et al., 20012). As the participants were viewing the emotional images, their brain activity was being monitored by MRI (Montag et al., 2012). Overall, the researchers found that the non-experienced gamers experienced a significantly higher activation of the left lateral frontal cortex than in the experienced gamers (Montag et al., 2012, p. 110). This area of the brain is a capable of blocking out unwanted images and memories, which suggest that the experienced gamers are less sensitive to violent images (Montag et al., 2012). In addition, the research also showed that the brains of experienced first-person-shooter gamers responded to the violent images similarly to that of a drug addict s when the addict encounters drugs (Montag et al, 2012). Exposure to first-person-shooter video games can damage the way adolescents naturally deal with aggression and process emotions. These studies provide strong evidence that violent first-person-shooter video games subconsciously change the emotional state of young gamers. The increasing popularity of firs-person-shooter video games combined with the advancement of video game realism could lead to greater emotional effects on today s youth. As technology

5 FPS VIDEO GAMES AND ADOLESCENTS 5 advances, it is important that researchers continue to monitor the damaging effects of firstperson-shooter video games on adolescents.

6 FPS VIDEO GAMES AND ADOLESCENTS 6 References Barlett, C. P., Harris, R. J., & Baldassaro, R. (2007). Longer you play, the more hostile you feel examination of first person shooter video games and aggression during video game play Aggressive Behavior, 33, doi: /ab Breuer, J., Festl, R., & Quandt, T. (2014). Aggression and preference for first-person shooter and action game: data from a large-scale survey of german gamers aged 14 and above. Communication Research Reports, 31, doi: / Montag, C., Weber, B., Trautner, P., Newport, B., Markett, S., Walter, N. T., Felten, A., & Reuter, M. (2012). Does excessive play of violent first-person-shooter-video-games dampen brain activity in response to emotional stimuli?. Biological Psychology, 89, doi: /j.biopsycho