The Final Post of the Semester: Video Games and Their Positive Effects

Violent Video Games and the Effects on Children

Since the date of the first video game known to man, 1947, there has been much controversy surrounding them. Video games have been praised for their abilities to create social bonds, and yet demonized for the way they do it, but there is one common factor between all video games; they are good for you. In the past 5 years, more and more studies have come out to support the fact that video games do help children in a myriad of ways. Some of these would include: increased visuospatial capabilities, increased speed of learning in the presence of them and increased motor reflexes. They also have an uncanny ability to help people with psychological ailments, such as PTSD patients. While video games come under frequent blame for the causation of a violent youth, none of the claims are accurate, and video games do prove to be a proponent of society rather that a detriment.

Video Games and Enhanced Learning Capabilities

One study done by a man named CJ Ferguson had found that, "playing violent video games remained related to higher visuospatial cognition" (Ferguson 1). This means that people whom were challenged with a puzzle after playing a violent game, were shown to finish it faster and more accurately than non-gaming subjects. This shows that video games can lead to temporary increases in a persons ability to think and reason logically, if played over a long course of time the games have also been shown to gradually increase visuospatial abilities permanently. This was also tested using a violent game, when done with primarily non-violent strategy games the effect was shown to be much greater and longer lasting, similar to that of playing chess or a game which is similar.

Why Do Children Swear Than?

Children do not swear because of games, they swear to feel accepted. An interesting video made by a

 

 YouTube channel called Vsauce, did an interesting cover on it. The video can be found at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dd7dQh8u4Hc The host Michael covers the different types of swearing and why we do it, the primary reason is to feel socially accepted and cool. Hearing a cuss word in a game doesn't make children want to swear, sure it exposes them to the word, but without a group to show it off to the child will not use it. Profanity in games simply isn't a powerful enough motivator to get kids to say the words they hear, essentially.

 

 

Immersion and its Effects

Immersion is a phenomenon whereby a player of a game feels like they are actually in the game. By putting themselves into such an environment they are allowing themselves to be subject to all which the character in the game would be subject to. Once immersed in a game the player will feel how the character feels, think how the character thinks. If the game which the player is immersed into is Grand Theft Auto the player will be allowed and able to enter the mind of a criminal, without the negative effects that going into actual crime would bring. In stealth genre gaming players must be fully aware of their environment at all times if they want to be successful. The best part about is that once coming out of the immersive experience the player will keep the benefits that would come with being able to experience what normally wouldn't be a possibility. Immersion can also be broke at any time, as people are always aware they are playing a game no matter how immersed they become. So if a traumatic event were to happen to the character the player would feel sympathy rather than empathy, due to the ability to break immersion.

Standard Education Through a Not So Standard Medium

We are all used to the classic teacher; you come to class, you be on time, you do your homework, and

you recite the information learned back to the teacher via examination. All pretty standard, yes, but a recent study done has shown that kids taught through the medium of video games not only had fun whilst learning, they learned things quicker and more strongly than other students. Alan Gershenfeld  states that, “[It has been] found that students who went straight to the lecture did not know what to listen for, whereas students who played the game first had better context and greater motivation” (Gershenfeld 3). Essentially when a child, or even an adult goes into a subject with even a slight background in it, even if it was learned unconsciously, they will perform better and retain more.

Video Games and Shootings: Not the Cause

A classic, and yet huge mistake by some mainstream medias, is to blame video games for shootings. Shootings while a unfortunate and devastating event, can't be linked back to one certain cause. A recent news story actually addressed this, "When a shooter is a young male, the news media make a fuss over violent video games, neglecting to inform the public that almost all young males play violent video games" (Peckham).  Often times these children will come from poor backgrounds, have some family issues, and occasionally they may even be users. All of these are contributing factors in what could cause the depression and hatred that most of these shooters felt. Simply witnessing people being shot at in games wouldn't be the thing to set someone off on such a violent fit of rage. There is a separation between video games and real life, and even the most immersive games can not provide an experience which could feel like a true loss to ones self.

A New Age: Time for a Change

A new age truly is upon us where we can experience everything at the tips of our fingers. With that power could come some fantastic changes for the better. Education will include gaming media, people will be learning at increased speeds and showing greater levels of spatial intelligence. All because one day a man decided that, yes, the world does need a new kind of game. Not all games can be outwardly "educational" looking, but all games really do give people benefits which they hardly ever knew.

 

 

The American Dream Web Text

The Great American Hoax

                Everyone who can be called an American has usually once in their life heard the concept of the American dream. You work hard, you become successful, and that’s that, but there are so many countless cases of this not being true that it’s a wonder why the American dream still lives in people’s hearts to this day. “The Working Poor” by David Shipler delves into the countless stories of people’s American dream being cast out the window and never looked back on again. While the American dream used to be something to look forward to, it is now an outdated belief ruined by modern societal beliefs.

A Penny Saved Is a Penny Earned…

   Americans have been ravaged by the recent economical down turn in ways you couldn't imagine. Everyone has been affected by it, namely common people, but also big business. Big businesses are in business for one reason, to make money and to keep the money they make. In modern economic times almost all businesses live by that old saying, “a penny saved is a penny earned”, and to save this penny it is almost always coming out of the workers pockets. A prime example of this would be Wal-Mart and its employees. One woman named Caroline who is outlined in “The Working Poor” was stated to have “earned $6.80 an hour stocking shelves and working cash registers at a vast Wal-Mart superstore” (Shipler 50). Caroline being a dedicated worker at Wal-Mart set aside years of her life to the store, constantly being promised raises in pay and growth in the company, only to be left in the dust making not a dime more than minimum wage to this day.

Living Expenses

          Housing in America isn't cheap, probably because there’s this all of this dream to go around here and all, but the average minimum wage worker can’t afford to live, the most basic premise of life, unless they hold two minimum wage jobs at the same time. Going back to Caroline, she was working a single minimum wage job at the time and using about half of it on living alone. “[She was earning] the equivalent of $3.70 [an hour] taking into account the rise in the cost of living” and this was over a decade ago. Since then housing prices have done nothing but go up over the years. The reason this happens in the first place is the fact that people let it happen. They accept rents of $600+ a month for a room no bigger than the average stock room at a small business because they are forced to by the housing oligopoly of the United States.  According to the graph above the only place that seems to have reasonable prices for living is Detroit, and we all know no one would want to live in Detroit.

Greed: For Workers and Their Businesses Alike

          Wages have always been an ever-present battle between businesses and their workers. Trying to ask for a higher wage is like going into a hostage negotiation, and it shouldn't be like that. Workers who work hard deserve a solid paying wage to show they are appreciated. Unfortunately big businesses hardly seem to agree, and certainly seem to be winning the battle of the wages right now. They feel they can get away with letting their co-workers have to half starve to death in order to keep as much money as they can, but that employee discount they give the employees must certainly be enough to make up for it. Robert H. Frank from "They Say, I say: With Readings" goes on to say, "the average inflation adjusted wage hourly wage declined by more than 7 percent" (Frank 581). This is to say that though the average worth of money was decreasing, businesses were less likely to give out more money via pay increases to their employees. The reason for doing so wasn't for self-sustainment, it was for pure, unadulterated, greed, and decreased wages weren't part of the American dream most go by.

An Overpriced Education System

                College has been around since the founding of America, and it doesn't seem to be going anywhere soon, but why are we as Americans so reluctant to change it. The only thing which seems to change in our educational system seems to be the pensions, coming ever earlier and being higher and higher, and that’s great, more power to the teachers; education is a powerful tool and having these people around to assist people in reaching their goals is a good thing. The way we do schooling here though is a joke now though, distinguished universities teaching the same material as community colleges for upwards of 600% more money? Like housing colleges pricing has well outpaced inflation and is merely a spawn of modern greed and desire to hoard as much money as you can before you kick the bucket. As stated by Kevin Carey in “They Say, I Say: With Readings”, “A quarter of all federal aid goes to for-profits, while they enroll only 10% of students” (Carey 216). This is because of the raw greed that our society is plagued with, until we do away with our greed and need to overprice everything, we will stay in the sorry state were in.

                Clearly Americans have a lot more to worry about than to dream about. Until we can get over ourselves and realize that we aren't progressing as a society, we will be stuck in our ever growing hole of and economic state. Maybe if we dream long enough, and hard enough than someone will actually take the initiative to start us in the right direction, until then we will just have to put up with the abuse which allow on ourselves. 

Works Cited

Gerald Graff, C. B. (2012). They Say, I Say: With Readings. London: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

Shipler, David K. The Working Poor: Invisible in America. New York: Knopf, 2004. Print.

Book Quotes Etc

Quotes: " She earned $6 an hour in a Vermont factory that made plastic cigaratte lighters and cases for Gillette razors. In 2000, she earned $6.80 an hor stocking shelves and working cash registers at a vast Wal-Mart superstore in New Hampshire" (Shipler 50).

"Or less -- the equivalent of $3.70 -- taking into account the rise in the cost of living" (51).

"she ended up with only $400 a month in child support and no share in their house"(56).

"For seven days a week she worked two part-time jobs --- one in a store for $5.25 an hour, the other for "four something" an hour answering phones"(61).

Well seeing as how your reading this, you are either in my class, or a very strange individual. Speaking of strange individuals.... Hello! My name is Corey. I am a college student currently enrolled in Joliet Junior College located in Illinois. I live in America, specifically Illinois. I am an aspiring artist and have composed many works of modern contemporary music. I dedicate hours of my life a day to playing and learning more about the piano, I would even say that music has taken over my life. Besides my dead end music carreer I would like to talk about my other...hobbies. I am an avid computer geek, building and repairing PC's for friends and family. I used to play ping pong and am still fairly good at it. Who am I though as far as looks though? I like to think of myself as a classy individual, even though as I write this I am wearing pajammas. I have brown hair and try to keep it short. Well I am bored of typing, until next time, whoever the strange individual is whom decided to read this.