Finnish Study Suggests Violent Games Do NOT Desensitize Players

Finnish Study Suggests Violent Games Do NOT Desensitize Players

Playing violent video games desensitizes players to real-world violence.

It’s an oft-repeated mantra among video game critics like Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and Miami attorney Jack Thompson.

But new research from Finland casts doubt on the desensitization theory. As reported by Shacknews, a team of researchers in Helsinki found that, rather than exulting, gamers became angry and anxious after killing an opposing character in James Bond 007: NightFire. Perhaps even more surprisingly, players had a positive response to their own character’s death.

The study, The Psychophysiology of James Bond: Phasic Emotional Responses to Violent Video Game Events tested 36 young adults, monitoring physiological data in synch with game play action. From the report:

From this perspective, the fact that wounding or killing the opponent elicited negative, not positive, emotional responses might be reassuring… Given that the player knows that it is only a game, events that, in the real world, are perceived as threatening may be perceived as positively challenging…

There was no evidence for desensitization of emotional responses as a function of repeated exposures to violent game events…

So, why do players react positively to their own character’s demise? The study authors speculate that the character’s death represents a respite from the tension of playing. The authors found a similar “tension break” effect in a 2005 study using a non-violent game, Super Monkey Ball 2.

Källa: gamepolitics.com