Listening to pundits and politicians, you'd think that the relationship between violent video games and aggressive behavior in children is clear. Children who play violent video games are more likely to be socially isolated and have poor interpersonal skills. Violent games can trigger real-world violence. The best way to protect our kids is to keep them away from games such as Grand Theft Auto that are rated M for Mature. Right? Wrong. In fact, many parents are worried about the wrong things! In 2004, Lawrence Kutner, PhD, and Cheryl K. Olson, ScD, cofounders and directors of the Harvard Medical School Center for Mental Health and Media, began a $1.5 million federally funded study on the effects of video games. In contrast to previous research, their study focused on real children and families in real situations. What they found surprised, encouraged and sometimes disturbed them: their findings conform to the views of neither the alarmists nor the video game industry boosters. In Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth about Violent Video Games and What Parents Can Do, Kutner and Olson untangle the web of politics, marketing, advocacy and flawed or misconstrued studies that until now have shaped parents' concerns. Instead of offering a one-size-fits-all prescription, Grand Theft Childhood gives the information you need to decide how you want to handle this sensitive issue in your own family. You'll learn when -- and what kinds of -- video games can be harmful, when they can serve as important social or learning tools and how to create and enforce game-playing rules in your household. You'll find out what's really in the games your children play and when to worry about your children playing with strangers on the Internet. You'll understand how games are rated, how to make best use of ratings and the potentially important information that ratings don't provide. Grand Theft Childhood takes video games out of the political and media arenas, and puts parents back in control. It should be required reading for all families who use game consoles or computers. Almost all children today play video or computer games. Half of twelve-year-olds regularly play violent, Mature-rated games. And parents are worried... "I don't know if it's an addiction, but my son is just glued to it. It's the same with my daughter with her computer...and I can't be watching both of them all the time, to see if they're talking to strangers or if someone is getting killed in the other room on the PlayStation. It's just nerve-racking!" "I'm concerned that this game playing is just the kid and the TV screen...how is this going to affect his social skills?" "I'm not concerned about the violence; I'm concerned about the way they portray the violence. It's not accidental; it's intentional. They're just out to kill people in some of these games." What should we as parents, teachers and public policy makers be concerned about? The real risks are subtle and aren't just about gore or sex. Video games don't affect all children in the same way; some children are at significantly greater risk. (You may be surprised to learn which ones!) Grand Theft Childhood gives parents practical, research-based advice on ways to limit many of those risks. It also shows how video games -- even violent games -- can benefit children and families in unexpected ways. In this groundbreaking and timely book, Drs. Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl Olson cut through the myths and hysteria, and reveal the surprising truth about kids and violent games.

"This book provides an academically oriented and scientifically based description of how technological advances may have contributed to a wide range of mental health outcomes, covering the spectrum from problems and maladies to improved and expanded healthcare services"--

Violent video games are successfully marketed to and easily obtained by children and adolescents. Even the U.S. government distributes one such game, America's Army, through both the internet and its recruiting offices. Is there any scientific evidence to support the claims that violent games contribute to aggressive and violent behavior? As the first book to unite empirical research on and public policy options for violent video games, Violent Video Game Effects on Children and Adolescents will be an invaluable resource for student and professional researchers in social and developmental psychology and media studies.

This volume compiles papers from the Young Academics Workshop at the Clash of Realities conferences of 2017 and 2018. The 2017 workshop - Perceiving Video Games - explored the video game medium by focusing on perception and meaning-making processes. The 2018 workshop - Reframing the Violence and Video Games Debate - transcended misleading claims that link video games and violent behavior by offering a range of fresh topical perspectives. From BA students to postdoctoral researchers, the young academics of this anthology stem from a spectrum of backgrounds, including game studies, game design, and phenomenology. This volume also features an entry by renowned psychologist Christopher J. Ferguson.

This book is an academic work which reviews and critiques the research literature concerning violent games and their alleged effects on players. It examines the debates about the potential effects of these games and the divisions between scholars working in the field. It places the research on violent video games in the longer historical context of scholarly work on media violence. It examines research from around the world on the nature of video games and their effects. It provides a critique of relevant theories of media violence effects and in particular theories developed within the older media violence literature and then considers how useful this and newer scholarly work might be for policy-makers and regulators. The book identifies where gaps exist in the extent literature and where future research attention might be directed.

The ebook edition of this title is Open Access, thanks to Knowledge Unlatched funding, freely available to read online. Drawing on the emerging deviant literature perspective, this book explores a range of culturally embedded harms and other activities to offer new insight on the idea that video games are intertwined with forms of deviancy.

Violence in Video Games provides a balanced look at a hot-button topic. Discover the controversy over whether video game violence affects players and crime statistics, as well as the history of video games, ratings systems, and the First Amendment. Full-color photos, a glossary, an index, sidebars, primary source documents, and other creative content enhance the book. It also includes prompts and activities that directly engage students in developing the reading, writing, and critical thinking skills required by the Common Core standards. This well-researched title has a credentialed content consultant and aligns with Common Core and state standards. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Core Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.