You might think that from the title of this article, that we’re going to rag on it, but there’s some interesting things to note from this study. First, let’s take a look at some of the particulars.

The study, written by Simmons College Communications Professor Edward T. Vieira, Jr., Ph.D. and published in the 2011 spring/summer edition of the Journal of Children and Media, discusses how children’s exposure to violent video games over time can impact their ability to develop empathy and sympathy for others. The study involved 166 children from 29 schools in the New Hampshire and Boston areas. Of the children, it was about a 2:1 ratio of boys to girls, in the range of 7-15 years of age.

Some of the highlights:

• frequent exposure to violent video games impact children’s perception that some types of violence are acceptable or “right.”
• children who spend a great deal of time playing violent video games (as defined by the ESRB) have an increased likelihood of accepting all types of violence
• boys spend twice the amount of time playing violent video games as girls do
• 71% of the video games reported contained at least some mild violence.
• 25% of the video games played contained intense violence, blood, and gore.
• Children who reported playing a number of video games, consistently played the same type of games whether violent, sports, etc.
• although many of the children polled ranged in ages from 7 to 12, many reported playing games rated M for Mature which are games designated for ages 17 and older

“Certainly not every child who continues to play violent video games is going to go out and perpetrate a violent act, but the research suggests that children — particularly boys — who are frequently exposed to these violent games are absorbing a sanitized message of ‘no consequences for violence’ from this play behavior,” said Vieira. “The concern arises when children are taking in this message and there is a convergence of other negative environmental factors at the same time, such as poor parental communication and unhealthy peer relationships.”

Okay, honestly, this study is confirming something that’s fairly intuitive: increased exposure to violence tends to desensitize people to it. You just don’t react to it the same over time, and thus your level of sympathy and empathy will be reduced. We’re not going to even argue this. Our point would be more that ANY exposure to violence can cause this, but this particular study focused on video games. How many of these children that were playing the violent games were also watching violent movies and TV shows? We think too much violence in general is the problem, don’t just focus on the video game aspect, as it’s just one part of the puzzle.

The more disturbing thing, to me I think, is the fact that kids this young are playing violent games in the first place. Check the last bullet point again. Many of these children were aged 7-12, but were playing M rated games. How does this happen? Why are young children playing games developed for adults? This should not be happening, and somebody’s not doing their job. So, of course, here we are talking about a study of how violent video games are linked to a loss of empathy in children, when the real story is that young children are getting their hands on and playing violent video games. The study isn’t telling us anything new, people!

Do we as parents need to be more vigilant? Apparently. Or is it more of not taking the time to care and understand what our kids are playing, and it’s just easier to buy that copy of Halo: Reach that they keep clamouring for? Either way, we need to serve our kids better. Then we won’t need studies like this because kids won’t be exposed to the violence as much in the first place.

Be better.