Tyler Secrest
Sonia Begert
English 102
2/12/2015
Literature Review
Video games have been given a bad rap by parents and the general population of adults today, with the assumption that video games are a time waster that lead to violence, laziness, non-productivity, ultimately, anti-socialism. However, unknown to the masses are the general benefits of playing a video game, such as the promotion of a good self-image, socialism, emotional engagement, and neuroplasticity, including more that I will not spoil. My purpose in writing this paper is to identify, promote, and discuss these benefits, all with the sources I’ve gathered. These sources show that video games aren’t all bad, and that they can actually have positive effects on one’s social behavior, self-esteem, health, learning capacity, and brain; these topics are categorized as follows: Social benefits, health benefits, and cognitive benefits.
Quite a large number of sources identify and give detailed information about the social benefits of gaming. “The Social Benefits of Video Games,” by Paul Tassi, provides an infographic from psychologydegree.net containing interesting facts and figures about multiple different benefits of video games from almost every field. This graphic includes information about the number of gamers, what parts of the brain video games have a positive effect on, what gamers can handle compared to non-gamers, how gamers are more likely to help someone in need, and tells of a gaming company that planted 25,000 trees in real life after gamers completed the task virtually in just 25 days. I will use this data hugely to my advantage, mainly the facts and figures (if not the graphic itself) in the social and cognitive sections of my paper. This article is just one of the many contained within the social category. One such article, by Harold Goldberg, addresses how video games can positively attribute to society in his article, “Where Film Marries Video Game.” Another article by Isabela Granic, Adam Lobel, and Rutger Engels, titled, “The Benefits of Playing Video Games,” gives information about the research these authors conducted. According to this research, playing video games, violence and all, might prove to have a positive effect on teen learning and social skills. This study is a result of health professionals debating violent media and its effects on youth. The research shows that teens who played strategy games improved upon school grades and problem solving skills, and that games can ward off anxiety and improve mood. With this research, I can provide better facts and evidence for the social and cognitive enhancements of playing video games. “Effects of Playing Video Games on Perception of One’s Humanity,” by Tobias Greitemeyer, is an article categorized into my social benefits section. Greitemeyer discusses the possibility that someone’s perception of him/herself can be altered through gaming, stating that media exposure has been shown to be a powerful determinant of social behavior. He then gives evidence, showing that video game exposure can prove to have positive implications regarding a person’s behavior. With this evidence, I can support my thesis statement in the social behavior section of my essay.
Included in the social benefits category as well are the articles contained within this paragraph. Eddie Makuch writes an article, titled “Games Can Enact Social Change, Troy Baker Says,” about Troy Baker, a ridiculously talented and popular voice actor for many video game characters. According to Makuch, Baker recently participated in an Ask Me Anything on Reddit.com. A fan asked him if games can enact social change, stating that a game Baker starred in got them through the death of their mother. He responds, telling his fan that they are the evidence of this possibility. Things like racism, loss, nationalism, and homosexuality can be addressed through video games. I will use this interview to support my thesis statement, and support the idea that games are socially beneficial in my section on socialism. As mentioned before, I have many articles addressing social change. Laura Parker’s article, “Not Just Playing Around Anymore: Games for Change Uses Video Games for Social Projects,” addresses social change by telling of a phenomenon in which gamers collected 250,000 in-game books, resulting in the donation of 250,000 real books to a nonprofit organization established to improve literacy and gender equality in developing countries. The social section of my essay is where this source will be referenced. This article, “The Social Benefits of Video Gaming: Are There Social Benefits Associated With Playing Video Games?” from Psychology Today, addresses social change as well. The research and evidence that the author provides promoting the social benefits that can result from gaming as well as the topics he discusses will fit nicely within my essay’s social section. Jordan Shapiro’s “Social And Emotional Benefits Of Video Games: Metacognition And Relationships,” helps narrow my topic, discussing multiple benefits of video gaming and showing that parents don’t need to be so concerned about gaming detriments. This source is an excellent candidate for my essay’s social and cognitive sections. Dan Starkey’s article, “Violent Video Games Help Me Get Beyond My Violent Past,” gives a grim look at his past experiences. According to Starkey, he almost stabbed a kid and he used to bully children with every chance he got. Today, he plays extremely violent video games, allowing him to get beyond his past violences. He plays the games and realized that he could never want to do something like this to others. These games teach him to be empathetic. If I were to reference this source, it would support the social benefits section of my essay, as video games have helped Starkey socially and emotionally. Romeo Vitelli addresses the social benefits of video games and answers the question, “are video games necessarily harmful?” in his article, “Are There Benefits in Playing Video Games?” The evidence he provides will be something for me to lean on in the writing of my essay’s social section.
One category I have established for the articles I’ve collected is the health benefits section. This section will discuss how the use of active video games promotes not only weight loss, but that they can revolutionize health care, and they improve the conditions of children with cerebral palsy. Allana LeBlanc’s article, “Active Video Games and Health Indicators in Children and Youth: A Systematic Review,” gives detailed information about solving a problem in our society: teens suffer from the absence of physical activity in their daily routines, replaced by time spent staring at a screen. This article discusses the use of video games to generate activeness in teens, while seeing gaming and screen-time as a possible solution rather than a problem. Allana LeBlanc and colleagues provide the results of this study, which clearly states that video games can be used as a way to engage active lifestyles in teens. Another article concerning health, by Kent Bottles, is titled “Will Avatars, Robots, and Video Games Replace Doctors?” Bottles begs the question, “What can video games teach us about changing behaviors to cope with chronic disease?” He introduces the idea that we, humans, should be considering video games as a possible tool for large-scale studies of human behavior. For my purposes, I will use what Bottles discusses and the information he provides to better explain the health benefits of gaming. Douglas Goldstein’s “Video Games to Revolutionize Health and Health Care,” very well demonstrates the positive impact that the gaming industry has on health care. Within the article, Goldstein says that, “the healthcare industry has been among the first to recognize the game-changing potential of games in business and other environments.” I can use the game-changing potential discussed here in support of my argument in my health benefits section.
My list of articles discussing the health benefits of gaming continues in this paragraph. “Do Gamers Make Better Surgeons?” by Sean Neill provides information that will prove beneficial to my argument. According to a 2007 study, surgeons who spent at least 3 hours a week gaming “made about 37% fewer mistakes in laparoscopic surgery and performed the task 27% faster than their counterparts who did not play video games.” This information will prove beyond beneficial in support of my essay, and will be located in the health section of my final essay. My final source discussing physical activity and health, titled “Exercise Intensity Levels in Children With Cerebral Palsy While Playing With an Active Video Game Console,” by
Robert Maxine and colleagues, discusses the positive impact that active video games have had on children with cerebral palsy. Children became more active and gained improved cardiorespiratory capacity as a result of playing active video games. This information will prove to be highly valuable to the health section of my argumentative essay.
The cognitive benefits of gaming is the third and final category that will be discussed in my essay. The following sources specifically discuss how video games improve cognitive ability and processing. Matthew Dye, Shawn Green, and Daphne Bavelier wrote an article, titled “Increasing Speed of Processing with Action Video Games.” According to Dye, Green and Bavelier, when reaction time is reduced, accuracy is lost, and with a quicker decision comes more mistakes. But their study shows that playing an action video game will decrease reaction time while still retaining accuracy, rather than there being a deficit to accuracy when the speed of a reaction becomes faster. This research will be incredibly beneficial for the cognitive benefits section of my essay. Another article that discusses the cognitive benefits of gaming is by Art Markman, and is titled “Can Video Games Make You Smarter (Or At Least More Flexible)?”. This article gives detailed information about an experiment between two groups playing different difficulties of the same game. The results: The group playing the harder difficulty had a much easier time with certain tasks, while the group playing the easier difficulty had a harder time with the same tasks. I will use this information to support my essay in the cognitive section. Julia Mayas conducts an experiment, discovering that playing video games can result in the plasticity of attentional functions in older adults. Her article, “Plasticity of Attentional Functions in Older Adults after Non-Action Video Game Training: A Randomized Controlled Trial,” contains the results of this experiment. I’ll use this information in the cognitive benefits section of my argumentative essay. Within this peer-reviewed article, David William Shaffer and colleagues discuss the educative power of video games. The article, titled “Video Games and the Future of Learning,” will prove beneficial the cognitive section of my essay.
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