Have you ever wondered how video games affect children? Why do some kids like to play these games? Video games are getting very popular and addictive. These games have positive and negative effects, both physically and mentally. Many experts believe that violence in video games increases violence in real life. While some experts believe contrary to it. They do not believe that playing of violent video games can cause increase in aggressive behavior. Some studies have proved that time spent playing video games can be educational because some games include problem solving tasks and require some logical thinking, and thus help children to improve skills like critical thinking, multitasking, and decision-making. These games can also be addictive sometimes, so we can say their negative effects are severe. There are many negative effects of video games on children like health issues, sleeping and eating pattern. It can also affect social life of children by isolating them from social interaction, which further causes many problems for them socially. So, though at some points video games are proven to be a source of education and entertainment, but the violent and antisocial behavior of children prove them bad for children, doing more harm than good.
Computer games can cause some physical symptoms. One of the negative effects of computer games on children is addiction. The social life of children is also affected by violent games, because children who play violent games like to isolate themselves from the society, friends and family. Addiction of video games lead to many problems. These include health issues like sleep disturbances, poor personal hygiene, eating irregularities, migraines, and obesity. Continuing long time sitting in front of gaming devices may lead to back aches, laziness, obesity, eye-sight problems, and weight gain. Due to the pulsing lights, flashes and loud sound, the excessive use of games can cause photosensitive seizures. These games also lead to damage the eating and sleeping patterns of kids, which may result to serious consequences sometimes. In South Korea, a gamer died due to playing some online game for fifty hours with only few breaks. According to police that gamer only took pauses to go to bathroom (Kim, 2019).
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According to Gentile and Anderson (2003), playing of video games can lead to increase in aggressive behavior, because video games are filled with violent actions. Though some other types of games are also popular among different age group, but throughout all age-groups, the popularity of violent video games remains at peak. Donald Trump, the ex-president of America, once stated that, “the level of violence on video games is really shaping young people’s thoughts”. American Academy of Pediatrics (July, 2016) stated about video games that the games, “should not use human or other living targets or award points for killing because this teaches children to associate pleasure and success with their ability to cause pain and suffering to others”.
Some video games can be the reason of unexpected deaths. Gamers are so much involved and occupied with their game environment which may lead to self-destruction, and sometimes it also can cause harm to other people. Pokémon Go is the good example of this. This game has caused many accidents, injuries and even deaths, because this game involve the player only in game environment. Games like Gears of War, PUBG, Mortal Kombat, Thrill Kill and Grand Theft Auto are some of the examples of violent games which include stabbing, shooting, buying weapons, and breaking traffic rules. These games are somehow responsible for increase in criminal activities by teenagers and some of the adults as well. According to some reports, the 18 years old gunman who has killed 9 people in Germany, in 2016, was big fan of a first-person shooter games (Scutti, 2018).
Considering all the things, the negative effects of video games outweigh their positive effects. The addiction to games and violent behavior of gamers is not only problematic for gamers but also for their surroundings. Though some video games lead to entertainment, learning, and improving of skills, but the violence and anti-social behavior caused by games are more severe than these benefits. This negative effect can be reduced by monitoring children, supervising them, and providing them with those games which boost up their skills and also increase their knowledge.
References
Ferguson, C. J. (2018, Feburary 16). ‘It’s Time to End the Debate About Video Games and Violence’. https://theconversation.com/its-time-to-end-the-debate-about-video-games-and-violence-91607
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