Gaming vs Genes?

[EWS]

Just read this from the BBC.  What do you think of it?

here

[Andrew]

obviously games can influence violence. (especially at early age, monkey see monkey do)

Or maybe people that are born or conditioned to violence (monkey see monkey do) enjoy playing violent games to vent out the violence in a virtual world so that they do not in the real world. :P

[Mahdi]

A recent cross cultural study determined that Japanese children watch television that is at least twice as violent as the television American children watch, but are nowhere near as violent.  The study determined that the difference between the two is that the parents of the Japanese children actually watched the programs with them, and talked to their children about the shows, while American parents park there children in front of the TV and go do other stuff.

[Egeides]

Nah... Japanese child shows aren't violent. All they do is to show the main heroes get killed and spill blood around while their second arm gets cut but, hey, it's not that bad ;D

A serious comment I would have: violence doesn't always incite to violence. If I show you a violent scene that shows violence as a bad thing, I don't think we could saw that it's the same thing as Karmaghedon or Grand Theft Auto (or worst now). But still, I don't know if GTA or Karmaghedon really have a negative aspect (or to which extent). I tend to have an hypothesis though: they bring violence to the extent that it can convince someone that it would be good irl (in real life).

And it depends. Personal experience: Diablo, Rainbow 6, Commando, GTA... and still no irl change compared to before (when I played Mario, Zelda... and now almost nothing). So if it has an influence, it may not be uniform.

[DukeLeto]

Personally,I think video games prevent violence by allowing you to vent your hostilitities into a harmless medium.  (Speaking partially from personal experience here.)

[Caid Ivik]

Just one ot, why do I have a fealing this thread was rather larger?

[Timenn]

Looks like our hard drive on the server is messing up. We lost a bunch of messages because of it, I think since Sunday of last week.

We should be getting a new hard drive soon but the server will be up and down until its fixed.

[Leto le Juste]

I agree with you Madhi: children have not to be alone. Their parents have to be here in order to explain them. But there is also another factor: the universe of the show. If you watch a TV manga (in Japan) you know it is an imaginary support, it is not reality, it is obvious and you known it. But if you see a film it is more difficult because there is no cut between the film landscape and reality. So your head have more difficulty to reconnect with reality.

Another point physic violence (fight, murder..) is a big problem but others forms of violence are worse (mental, language..) because it is easier to imitate it (monkey see monkey do ;))

[Edric O]

Violence in children is a complex issue, and it's silly to believe we can pin it on a single cause like games or genes. The truth is that most of the blame lies with the parents. And, of course, they are unwilling to accept this responsibility - which is why they look for scapegoats.

[Leto le Juste]

We can say : you don't born violent but you become violent. The environment where you live influence you.

[Mahdi]

Violence in children is a complex issue, and it's silly to believe we can pin it on a single cause like games or genes. The truth is that most of the blame lies with the parents. And, of course, they are unwilling to accept this responsibility - which is why they look for scapegoats.

Now that depends entirly on your school of thought.  The general consensus among psychologists nowadays is that parents ARE being used as scapegoats, people are blaming the parents too much, for both a childs success or failures, when there actions may have absolutly nohting to do with them. The child may simply have a violent temperment and there is absolutly nothing that can be done about it.  Your genes are important, your environments are important, but somethings are simply a part of a childs temperment that they are born with, and that nothing can change.

[Acriku]

The way I see it is that genes are the backbone of our development, and the environment adds on, deletes, or changes the backbone.

[alchemi2]

The general consensus among psychologists nowadays is that parents ARE being used as scapegoats, people are blaming the parents too much, for both a childs success or failures, when there actions may have absolutly nohting to do with them.

What a crock that is ! babies are not born with personalities, these develop over a period of time due to experiences. It is up to parents to instill values upon their children. Most kids spend more time at home than at school. Teachers can only reinforce good behavior or help to moderate behavior within their sphere of influence. I've worked in schools as a play ground assistant and been a governor at my local primary school for nearly 15 years, I know kids who are violent little shites at home but well behaved at school. This is due to lack of disipline in the home and no moral values. Parents failing to set standards for their kids or spend time with them.

The Japanese have a strong cultral sense of honour, family, respect and the work ethic, unlike many western cultures.

In England we have weaken standards of disipline and often reward bad behavior rather the punishing the culprits.

Parents needed to take responsibility for their kids, infact society as a whole needs to return to older values of respect and disipline.

Until we regain moral standards and act accordingly then we will continue to see a decline into violence.