Topic: Aggression caused by video games

Source 1:

1. “2019 Essential Facts About the Computer and Video Game Industry.” Entertainment Software Association, 29 May 2019,theesa.com/esa-research/2019-essential-facts-about-the-computer-and-video-game-industry/.
2. This study was conducted by the Entertainment Software Association, a government institution of the United States tasked with providing a voice in the government for their members. Most large companies of the video game industry are members of the ESA, such as Electronic Arts and Microsoft. The ESA is also responsible for creating the ESRB
3. The genre of this source is a scholarly study. The types of information that is listed within this study involves graphs, charts, and percentages all relating to video games and the American public.
4. There is no real main argument within this source primarily because it is just to publish statistics on the video game industry.
5. Keywords:
   1. ESA Essential Facts
   2. Video Games
   3. Statistics
   4. Gen X
   5. Millennial
   6. Boomer
6. This source might be useful to me because it allows me to see which kinds of genres are the most popular amongst each generation of American video game players. Considering my paper is about aggression caused by video games, I think the statistics about who plays action games and shooter games will help me argue why it may be important to limit violence in video games. In the article, many action video game players are young-adults or children and many action games are often gruesome and ultra-violent so I think I can try to draw some parallels between the age range of action video game players and violence in these games.

Source 2:

1. “A Timeline of Video Game Controversies.” National Coalition Against Censorship, ncac.org/resource/a-timeline-of-video-game-controversies. 
2. This webpage was written by the National Coalition Against Censorship, a non-profit organization consisting of 50 businesses whose goal is to advocate for freedom of speech.
3. The genre of this source is a timeline. This timeline was found on a resource page from NCAC on their official website. The timeline is meant to be a visual representation of the history behind video game controversies and government attempts to regulate video games and the video game industry.
4. Again, there is no real main argument that is stated within the source because it is a timeline and therefore objective. However, the different colors that represent different events within the timeline might indicate that the author(s) of the article looks down upon the regulation of video games.
5. Keywords:
   1. Video Game Controversies
   2. Censorship
   3. Government Regulations on video gams
   4. Protect Children from Video Game Sex and Violence Act of 2003
6. This source might be useful to me when drafting my CP because it gives me a good overview of the history behind government attempts to control video games. I think this source would also be useful to me when talking about the history portion behind the problem my paper addresses.

Source 3:

1. “A Toxic Culture: Studying Gaming’s Jerks.” The Toxic Meritocracy of Video Games: Why Gaming Culture Is the Worst, by Christopher A. Paul, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis; London, 2018, pp. 63–90. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/j.ctt2204rbz.5.
2. This book was written by Christopher A. Paul, an associate professor of communication and Chair of the Department of Communication at Seattle University. Paul has written three total books on the topic of video games that discusses the social impact of video games as a medium of entertainment.
3. A Toxic Culture: Studying Gaming’s Jerks is a non-fiction book that discusses the subculture that surrounds video games. This is a scholarly book and thus indicates that this book is made to present new ideas about the topic at hand and very specific to what it addresses.
4. The main argument of this book is that harassment and verbal abuse that are commonly seen in online video games comes from a unique meritocracy that surrounds competitive video games. The author goes on to argue that players with more skill will feel dominant over those who have less skill at a video game. The author also argues that this hidden meritocracy that surrounds competitive games is often unfair in a sense that because video games are usually very similar to each other in terms of objectives, control schemes, etc, individuals who have had exposure to certain genres will have a skill edge on players who have never played the genre.
5. Keywords:
   1. Meritocracy
   2. Toxicity
   3. Subculture
   4. Gamer
6. This article may be useful for me because it also explores the causes as to why people participate in generally toxic behavior in online video games. I found that the author’s arguments about how meritocracy relates to video games and skill especially because I have experienced this relationship myself. I think this source will also serve as reinforcement to the first article that I chose because it helps bridge a missing gap between societal standards and video games. This article can also help me support my core claim within my essay that competition in video games can lead to the facilitation of aggression.

Source 4:

1. Adachi, Paul J. C. and Teena Willoughby. “Psychology of Violence The Effect of Video Game Competition and Violence on Aggressive Behavior: Which Characteristic Has the Greatest Influence?” (2011).
2. This is a scholarly journal article by Paul J. C. Adachi and Teena Willoughby who are both from Brock University in Canada. Teena Willoughby is a professor of Psychology from the Faculty of Social Sciences. She has published multiple works relating to adolescent mental health, health-risk behaviors, and brain development. She also has a Ph.D. in Psychology. Paul J. C. Adachi has a Ph.D. in Psychology with a social-developmental focus. Adachi has published multiple works on the impact of video games on youth.
3. This article was published in an academic journal, the Psychology of Violence, a peer-reviewed journal that focuses on “violence and extreme aggression, including identifying the causes of violence from a psychological framework, finding ways to prevent or reduce violence, and developing practical interventions and treatments.”
4. The main argument of the article is that competition in video games is the cause of increased aggression amongst youth video game players rather than violence. To support their claim, the authors conducted a study to record aggressive behaviors after exposure to a violent video game and a competitive one. The authors found that violent video games don’t change any aggression levels with players whereas competition between players significantly affected the aggressive behavior of players. The authors also found increased heart rates and psychological arousal levels in players that played more competitive video games as opposed to just violent ones.
5. Keywords:
   1. Competition
   2. eSports
   3. Aggressive Behavior
   4. Trait aggression
6. I think this article would be useful for me in describing another factor that may affect aggression levels in video game players. Because my essay is going to cover aggression in video games, I think it would be interesting to talk about a lesser known viewpoint on a source of aggression. Personally, I feel that competition in video games is an important aspect of many modern video games and I think that the competition alone can facilitate hostility. This source also somewhat intertwines with source 3 since competitive systems in video games also encourages the growth of a video game meritocracy.

Source 5:

1. Bruce D. Bartholow, Brad J. Bushman, Marc A. Sestir, Chronic violent video game exposure and desensitization to violence: Behavioral and event-related brain potential data, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Volume 42, Issue 4, 2006, Pages 532-539, ISSN 0022-1031, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2005.08.006
2. This article was written by Bruce D. Bartholow, from the University of Missouri, Brad J. Bushman, from Ohio State University, and Marc A. Sestir, from the University of Central Arkansas. All three of the authors are professors of psychology at their respective universities and each holds Ph.D.’s in psychology.
3. This article was published in an academic journal, the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. From this I can expect to see academic language and maybe some jargon relating to video games and psychology, the fields of interest for this group of researchers.
4. The main argument of this article is that violence in video games trains the brain to become desensitized to violence in real life. This argument is supported by a study that was conducted for this research paper that measured levels of aggression in individuals who were either exposed to violent video games or not. The authors also found that the brain’s psychology is affected when it comes to being exposed to violent video games perhaps implying that this desensitization of violence from violent video games is inevitable.
5. Keywords:
   1. Desensitization to violence
   2. P300 amplitude
   3. Cortical response
   4. Stimulus/stimuli
6. I think this article would be useful for me when describing the portion of my problem that deals with violence in video games. In my paper, I will note how violent video games can desensitize people to real world violence and this claim exactly coincides with the main argument of this paper. I also think that the discussion on how exactly the brain becomes desensitized is interesting because the study indicates that violent video games actually affects involuntary functions of the brain.

Source 6:

1. Euteneuer, Jacob. “Defining Games, Designing Identity, and Developing Toxicity: Future Trends in Game Studies.” New Media & Society, vol. 21, no. 3, 2018, pp. 786–790., doi:10.1177/1461444818809716.
2. This article was written by Jacob Euteneuer, a researcher from Oklahoma State University. Euteneuer has published multiple works on video game studies and primarily focuses on human-computer interaction. He works in the department of English at Oklahoma State University – Stillwater.
3. This article was published in New Media & Society, a peer-reviewed academic journal that publishes research pertaining to communication. This article is also more of a book review rather than a scholarly study.
4. The main argument of this article is that the three books that is reviewed in the article demonstrates that game studies is becoming a much larger and more necessary field to study. As Euteneuer writes, “these books [described in this article] exemplify, game studies is able to borrow from a diverse array of fields including sociology, anthropology, literary criticism, philosophy, cultural studies, fan studies, feminism, Marxism, and more.” The author also argues that video games as an art form are legitimate texts that should be worthy of critical scholarly attention and should be expanded upon by other scholars.
5. Keywords:
   1. Literary Criticism
   2. Video games as texts
   3. Meritocracy
   4. Video games in academia
6. This article would be useful for me in understanding some important scholarly texts on video games. The author of this article focuses, in one part of the article, on The Toxic Meritocracy of Video Games which is the third source for this paper. The author also simplifies the main argument of each book that he covers making it much easier for me to understand and saving me a lot of time. In a lot of ways, the simplification of these books’ main arguments helps me since it allows me to quote the main arguments of these books in a much more concise manor that is adequate for this project.

Source 7:

1. Tang, Wai Yen, and Jesse Fox. “Men’s Harassment Behavior in Online Video Games: Personality Traits and Game Factors.” Aggressive Behavior, vol. 42, no. 6, Nov. 2016, pp. 513–521. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1002/ab.21646.
2. This article was written by associate professor Jesse Fox from Ohio State University with the help of Wai Yen Tang, a graduate student who is studying communication. Fox has dedicated much of his research towards the effects and implications of new technologies, particularly platforms that involve virtual worlds or interactions with other people on the internet. He has a B.A. in English and communication from the University of Kentucky and a Ph.D. in communication from Stanford University.
3. This article was published in a journal known as Aggressive Behavior, a bimonthly peer-reviewed scientific journal that covers research pertaining to aggression and its relationship to psychology, anthropology, and sociology. Academic Journals are usually peer-reviewed and present new research on topics. The author establishes credibility by citing many authors who have previously discussed the topic of harassment in video games including himself.
4. The goal of this article is to relate previous academic works about sexual harassment in nonmediated environments to the academic works regarding sexist gaming beliefs through new research. The authors, after conducting their own research, concluded that “This study found that certain personality factors and contextual factors predict men’s harassment behavior in online video games.” Moreover, social dominance orientation and hostile sexism play key roles in influencing male harassment towards individuals in online environments; males, particularly in environments that are associated with masculinity, are more likely to feel the need to assert dominance.
5. Keywords:
1. Harassment
2. Video games
3. Sexual harassment
4. Dominance
5. Deindividuation
6. This article may be useful for me because it explores the causes as to why people participate in general and sexual harassment in online environments. Psychology is a major factor when it comes to why people choose to act certain ways and this article discusses some psychological aspects which I plan to delve into if I write my paper about this topic. This article, however, does not thoroughly discuss the effects of harassment in online environments so further exploration of this topic is required in order to work towards a greater understanding of this topic.

Source 8:

1. Fox, Jesse, and Wai Yen Tang. “Women’s Experiences with General and Sexual Harassment in Online Video Games: Rumination, Organizational Responsiveness, Withdrawal, and Coping Strategies.” New Media & Society, vol. 19, no. 8, Aug. 2017, pp. 1290–1307. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1177/1461444816635778.
2. This article was written by Jesse Fox and Wai Yen Tang. I have already covered the authors’ credentials in the first source.
3. Like the first source, this article is from an academic journal which means we can hold this article to certain standards that distinguishes this article from popular sources. Peer-reviewing, research, and pioneering ideas are a few important characteristics of academic articles from journals.
4. The main argument of this source is that women’s experiences of general and sexual harassment in online video games often leads to negative consequences. The author claims that sexual and general harassment in online video games discourages women from playing online games; women tend to take personal attacks towards them more seriously and as a result of the rampant verbal abuse and harassment in online games, thanks to anonymity of people through online personas, many women tend to stray away from competitive online games. For those women that have played or still play online video games often try to use coping methods to avoid taking hurtful comments to heart including avoiding voice chat or leaving online games.
5. Keywords:
   1. Coping method
   2. Organizational responsiveness
   3. Rumination
   4. Player vs player
6. I think this article would be useful for me because it gives me more insight on people’s experiences of the online toxic player base that has been running rampant in online games. This article will also help me write my introduction to the article because it gives evidence that verbal abuse and harassment are directly affecting people’s interest in video games or certain genres of video games. The author also has a brief discussion about automated harassment detection systems in some online games which would be interesting to talk about in terms of possible solutions to the problem that my paper will address.

Source 9:

1. Greitemeyer, Tobias, and Dirk O. Mügge. “Video Games Do Affect Social Outcomes: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Effects of Violent and Prosocial Video Game Play.” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, vol. 40, no. 5, May 2014, pp. 578–589, doi:10.1177/0146167213520459.
2. This article was written by Tobias Greitemeyer and Dirk O. Mugge. Greitemeyer works at the University of Innsbruck in the Institute of Psychology in Austria. Greitemeyer has published multiple works relating to the field of video games and has discussed the aspect of aggression resulting from video games in earlier works. Mugge is from the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences in Hamburg, Germany. Mugge has never published any works relating to video games prior to this one.
3. This article is from a scholarly journal called the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. Like all other scholarly journals, the standard of academic language, jargon, and peer reviewing can be expected from this journal.
4. The main argument of this source is that video games have an effect on social behavior and cognitive abilities for players. This main argument is supported by a study that observed both aggressive behavior and helping behavior after being exposed to different types of video games. The authors also argue that different types of video games affect the psychology of players in different ways. For example, violent video games were found to increase aggression and decrease prosocial outcomes whereas prosocial games decreased aggression and increased prosocial outcomes.
5. Keywords:
   1. Helping behavior
   2. Aggressive cognition
   3. Cognitive-emotional constructs
   4. Player vs player
6. I think this article would be useful to me because it demonstrates how the type of game that players play yields different cognitive outcomes. Since my paper talks about violent video games and its relationship to aggression, I think it’s important to note that violent video games are unique in terms of what kinds of responses that these types of games trigger. The article also coincides with some of the main arguments from other articles that I have included within my paper so I can also use this paper to reinforce already existing claims that I may have in my paper that are based on other scholarly arguments.

Source 10:

1. O’ LEARY, AMY. “In Virtual Play, Sex Harassment Is All Too Real.” New York Times, vol. 161, no. 55851, 2 Aug. 2012, p. 1. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=78206547&site=ehost-live&scope=site.
2. This news article was written by Amy O’Leary, a former New York Times journalist. She has written multiple Emmy nominated articles and has discussed the social aspect of video games in a few other articles.
3. This is a newspaper article meaning that it reports on a current event that has impacted a community in some way. This is a popular source meaning that the analysis of the topic is relatively low and does not bring any new discussion to the academic dialogue about video games. Newspaper articles also tend to have many pictures and does not have as much jargon as would a scholarly source meaning that this is probably much easier to read.
4. The main argument of this news article is that sexual harassment in the gaming community is a rampant issue that needs to be addressed. The author wants to draw attention to a problem in which she implies is not a major issue that is being discussed. She also reports on a recent case of sexual harassment in the gaming community and includes numerous reactions from people within the gaming community. All in all, this article seems like it is trying to raise awareness for an unseen social issue that needs to be addressed the tone of the author within the article sort of reaffirms this notion.
5. Keywords:
1. Miranda Pakozdi
2. Esports
3. Bigotry
4. Internet troll
6. I think this article would be useful for me because it is a popular source that can help me develop my introduction to the topic. If I were to write my paper about this topic, I think my introduction would have a part that would discuss why and how this topic has been an issue in the contemporary period and why it needs to be addressed. I think this article allows me to get a semi-recent account of sexual harassment in the gaming world and will thus hopefully indicate to the viewer that the problem of harassment in video games is still a rampant issue today.

Source 11:

1. Tang, Wai Yen, and Jesse Fox. “Men’s Harassment Behavior in Online Video Games: Personality Traits and Game Factors.” Aggressive Behavior, vol. 42, no. 6, Nov. 2016, pp. 513–521. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1002/ab.21646.
2. This article was written by associate professor Jesse Fox from Ohio State University with the help of Wai Yen Tang, a graduate student who is studying communication. Fox has dedicated much of his research towards the effects and implications of new technologies, particularly platforms that involve virtual worlds or interactions with other people on the internet. He has a B.A. in English and communication from the University of Kentucky and a Ph.D. in communication from Stanford University.
3. This article was published in a journal known as Aggressive Behavior, a bimonthly peer-reviewed scientific journal that covers research pertaining to aggression and its relationship to psychology, anthropology, and sociology. Academic Journals are usually peer-reviewed and present new research on topics. The author establishes credibility by citing many authors who have previously discussed the topic of harassment in video games including himself.
4. The goal of this article is to relate previous academic works about sexual harassment in nonmediated environments to the academic works regarding sexist gaming beliefs through new research. The authors, after conducting their own research, concluded that “This study found that certain personality factors and contextual factors predict men’s harassment behavior in online video games.” Moreover, social dominance orientation and hostile sexism play key roles in influencing male harassment towards individuals in online environments; males, particularly in environments that are associated with masculinity, are more likely to feel the need to assert dominance.
5. Keywords:
1. Harassment
2. Video games
3. Sexual harassment
4. Dominance
5. Deindividuation
6. This article may be useful for me because it explores the causes as to why people participate in general and sexual harassment in online environments. Psychology is a major factor when it comes to why people choose to act certain ways and this article discusses some psychological aspects which I plan to delve into if I write my paper about this topic. This article, however, does not thoroughly discuss the effects of harassment in online environments so further exploration of this topic is required in order to work towards a greater understanding of this topic.

All of these sources have many things in common with each other. In my essay, I tried to divide the causes of my problem into two separate areas: violence in video games and competition in video games. For the articles that addressed how violence in video games influences aggression, many of the scholarly articles involved very similar keywords and similar research methods that all pertained to the psychology of video game players. However, some articles tend to go more in depth than other ones. For example, the Bartholow article goes more in-depth on the effects of violent video games on a few specific brain functions whereas the Greitemeyer article expands more horizontally, instead talking about how different types of video games affect different behaviors in general. This kind of attitude was somewhat similar when describing the aspect of competition in games. However, what I think is interesting about the sources I chose is that a lot of the scholars who argue that competition leads to aggression would disagree with those that say that violence is the main source of aggression from violent video game players. This is evident in the Adachi article where the authors found evidence that indicated that aggression from video games is more likely to be from competition than violence.