Video Games And Aggression A Debate Between...

Feiyang Qian Could Playing Violent Video Games Predict Aggression? A Debate Between Socialization Hypothesis and Selection Hypothesis Bard College Word Count: 1722 Along with the increase of population who play video games, there raised a huge concern about the video games and its possible outcome. One potential issue is the relationship between violent video games and aggression. There are two seemingly competitive hypotheses from previous studies, interpreting the relationship: one is socialization hypothesis which states that the repeated exposure of violent media (i.e., video games) leads to an elevation of aggression over time; another one is selection hypothesis which states that individuals who are more aggressive†¦show more content†¦A longitudinal study by Breuer, et al. on violent video games and aggression pointed out that physical aggressiveness could predict long-term use of violent video games while the reserve relationship is not statistically supported (Breuer et al., 2015). In order to examine the possible long-term effect on aggression induced by playing violent video games, Breuer, et al. designed a one-year longitu dinal study with 276 participants, aged between 14 to 21. Besides possible background factors, Breuer et al. measured physical aggression level instead of aggressive thoughts some previous studies focused on since it was already reported that both socialization and selection hypotheses are more likely to occur if the behavior presented in the game and the one exhibited in real life are similar (Mà ¶ller Krahà ©, 2009). Physical aggressiveness is most commonly featured in violent video games so that it is more likely to test their hypothesis by comparing physical aggression before and after long-term exposure to violent video games. For both the first and second wave one-year later, they measured participants’ physical aggressiveness using Aggression Questionnaire (AQ) (Buss Perry, 1992) and their preference for video games by asking their favorite and currently-played video games which were rated via age rating system Unterhaltungssoftware Selbskongrolle (USK) (see www.us k.de/en) for violence level and their frequency