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<\/p>\nOn July 4th, 2022, a man in Illinois took to the rooftop and fired rounds of bullets on the Independence Day parade participants, killing 5 people with 2 more dying later from their wounds and injuring even more.<\/p>\n
The man, soon identified by the police, is Robert Crimo III, aged 21.<\/p>\n
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The mass shooting devastated the close-knit community of Highland Park. Most people knew Crimo III as the son of a well-known business owner and mayoral candidate Robert Crimo Jr.<\/p>\n
The agonizing aftermath has raised endless questions regarding the reasons and motives that led to his devastating action. Motives, however, are always complex issues interlaced with upbringing, environment, and a person\u2019s own unique circumstances.<\/p>\n
What is obvious is the increased trend in violent crimes committed by younger perpetrators.<\/p>\n
The median age for those committing gun-related crimes has been decreasing, down to 35 in 2018 from 39.5 for handgun shootings. The median age is even lower for assault rifle shootings at 31 years, and just 21 years for school shootings.<\/p>\n
From Salvador Ramos\u2019s school shooting in Uvalde, to Robert Crimo III in Highland park, to Payton Gendron and the many other young adult and teenage perpetrators of such crimes, we find commonalities among the backgrounds of each individual.<\/p>\n
In addition to possible behavioral problems and fatherless homes or sparse parental involvement, another similarity is the obsession with and excessive hours spent on the internet or video games, especially those containing violence.<\/p>\n
This curious commonality begs the question of whether violent video games and internet activity could play a role in precipitating acts of such horrific violence.<\/p>\n
Violent Media Increases Interest In Firearms<\/strong><\/p>\n Some researchers suggest that violent media breeds an interest in violence and weaponry.<\/p>\n Dr. Brad Bushman once did an experiment that suggested \u201cviolent media was a risk factor for dangerous behavior around real guns.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n In the study, he split 242 children into three groups and had each group watch a video for 20 minutes.<\/p>\n The first group watched a Minecraft video that was violent with guns, the second watched a Minecraft video that was violent with swords, and the third group watched a non-violent video.<\/p>\n The children were then asked to play with toys and games in another room. The room contained two disabled handguns.<\/p>\n Most of the children who watched the video with guns would touch a gun, pull the trigger, and point it at one another. The group of children who watched the video with swords touched the guns less frequently while those who watched a non-violent video touched the guns the least.<\/p>\n From this study, Bushman suggested that \u201cexposure to violent video games can increase a child\u2019s interest in firearms, including shooting a handgun at themselves or others<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n However, such small game play is not going to cause a person to become a mass shooter or a perpetrator of violent crime. It is a series of complex issues that pushes a person down the path to commit violence.<\/p>\n Before violence comes aggression.<\/p>\n Learning Aggression From Violent Media<\/strong><\/p>\n Renowned psychologist Dr. Douglas Gentile from the University of Iowa has studied violent media and aggression for over 30 years. He likens the relationship between violent media and aggressive behavior to smoking and cancer.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not a simple mechanistic thing, not like you watch a violent movie and then you go do something violent. That\u2019s not the way this works; it\u2019s much more subtle than that<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAlthough there are short term effects [of aggression]\u2026 the short term effects usually dissipate after about 20\u2026 30 minutes. Just like smoking\u2026 that one cigarette does not give you cancer, and you know the effects of it do wear off after an hour or whatever, but if you continually consume it, then each one is increasing the odds of a more extreme result<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Gentile was not too keen on linking violent media and acts of violence but acknowledged that violence is a rare endpoint of aggression.<\/p>\n Though some people can become aggressive, very few of them will later develop violent outbursts. It is a complex issue.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, aggression can be a learned behavior, trained through exposure to violent media, especially through violent video games.<\/p>\n Gentile defined aggression as the intent to harm, explaining that it can be physical, verbal, and cyber, among others while violence is only physical and is typically more extreme.<\/p>\n His years of research have since demonstrated that long-term exposure to violent media creates very subtle changes in a person\u2019s cognitive response to aggression and violence, training a person to become more aggressive in their behavior and their thinking.<\/p>\n Gentile listed four main effects that are well established within the psychology research community on violent media.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s first of all, what\u2019s called an \u2018aggressor effect,\u2019 that the more entertained violence you watch, the more willing you become to behave aggressively when provoked<\/em>\u201d, Gentile said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe second is the \u2018victim effect,\u2019 that the more entertainment and violence you see in the media, the more you start seeing\u2026 the world as a much more dangerous and scary place<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n The third effect is the \u2018bystander effect<\/em>,\u2019 meaning that we can become more desensitized and possibly even callous to the violence that has been experienced by someone else.<\/p>\n The final is the \u2018appetite effect<\/em>,\u2019 which means that the more violent media we see the more we will want to see it. These changes in our perception also affect our cognition, on how we may respond to aggression and provocation, Gentile explained.<\/p>\n These effects, however, are not a one-size-fits-all as different people will experience different effects depending on the content, amount consumed, and various individual complexities.<\/p>\n Between the two genders, males tend to be more affected by the aggressor, bystander and appetite effects whereas females are more influenced by the victim effect.<\/p>\n To illustrate how violent media, especially video games, can train a person to become more aggressive, and in extreme and complex situations to become violent, Gentile described a previous research study he led with students from Singapore.<\/p>\n More than 3000 students were surveyed over three years on their video game use, the level of violence, length of gameplay, and also how they would respond in aggressive or provoking situations.<\/p>\n It was assumed that responses would reflect the underlying aggressive behavior and cognition of the students.<\/p>\n Aggressive cognition in the study was separate into three aspects, namely aggressive fantasy (how much one thinks about harming others), hostile attribution bias (the bias to interpret situations as hostile rather than benign), and normative beliefs about aggression (the degree of aggression in a response that a person thinks is acceptable).<\/p>\n Gentile found those students who played violent video games, mostly children in primary school, exhibited greater aggressive behaviors as well as all three aspects of aggressive cognition.<\/p>\n Gentile explained that violent video games trains the bias for hostility, as participants are waiting for violence and \u201care practicing being hyper-vigilant for aggression<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Video games also reward gamers when they respond to violence with violence, consolidating this aggressive learning. Gentile argued that being exposed to other violent media also amplifies this reward process.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, the whole time you are consuming violent media, you are rehearsing along with it, aggressive fantasies, so all three of these aggressive cognitions increase among the kids who played more violent video games, and by the end of the study, those kids were being more physically aggressive<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n He gave a hypothetical scenario where a student who plays violent games gets bumped in the school hallway and how this may escalate to a fight because of the learning he or she did through gaming.<\/p>\n Gentile said that the hours of video game training to be vigilant for aggression can make a person interpret such an event as one of aggression or provocation rather than a simple accident.<\/p>\n \u201cThat tiny change in perception changes everything downstream from it<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n In games, once a player encounters an aggressive stimulus, the immediate reaction is to turn to the stimulus and respond aggressively.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, the thing that humans do, especially when they\u2019re under stress, is the thing that comes to mind first, well, the thing that comes to mind first is the thing you\u2019ve practiced the most<\/em>,\u201d Gentile said.<\/p>\n The student\u2019s immediate response may be aggression such as returning the shove or saying something unkind, however, \u201cthat\u2019s not enough to get the kids to do it<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s kind of a high bar to doing it, because once you do, the odds that this could turn into a real fight skyrocket. But because you\u2019ve been rewarded [in the games], and you\u2019ve enjoyed consuming all this media violence, that bar has been lowered quite a bit<\/em>,\u201d Gentile explained, highlighting the steps that take virtual aggression to physical aggression.<\/p>\n However, Gentile argued that when aggressive cognition spills into daily life as aggressive behaviors, no one in the moment would connect that to violent games or violent media as the cause of such behaviors.<\/p>\n \u201cKids aren\u2019t copying [the actions in the games]. That\u2019s not how it works<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c[Violent media] changes the way we perceive the world and the way we think, and we take the way we perceive the world and the way we think with us everywhere.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n Brain Differences In Obsessive Video Game And Internet Users<\/strong><\/p>\n Studies examining the benefits of gaming have found that video gamers who play in moderation had better visuospatial skills which are trained in popular games such as Tetris. Additionally, some people can improve their decision making and social skills from action games that require teamwork and an overall fast response rate in order to win.<\/p>\n However, research into individuals with obsessive video game play or internet use shows that these individuals have reduced brain volume as compared to individuals who do not game or use the internet excessively.<\/p>\n Video game players and those that spend a long time online, have reduced grey matter (neurons) in the prefrontal areas as well as in many other areas of the brain. The prefrontal area is in charge of complex thinking, decision making, self-control, and impulse. Loss of grey matter may indicate poorer impulse control, poorer decision making, and impaired thinking.<\/p>\n In the short-term, violent video games have also been shown to reduce brain activation in regions responsible for emotional processes, indicating reduced empathy.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/violent-media2-e1663704171648.jpg\")
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