Belfer Center
Steven Pinker (@sapinker), Cognitive Scientist and Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, talks with Aroop Mukharji (@aroopmukharji) about violence and video games, war, and why academic writing is so bad.
Listen to the full interview: https://soundcloud.com/belfercenter/sets/office-hours
More about Steven Pinker: http://stevenpinker.com
Belfer Center website: http://www.belfercenter.org
Mukharji:
What is the research on kids and violent video games? Are those desensitizing kids to violence?
Pinker:
Nah.
Mukharji:
Or are they, is it sublimation—the idea that you can, you channel those basic urges into safe and socially acceptable channels?
Pinker:
I think it’s, it’s neither. That, um… If consuming violent media made you violent, then we should prevent adults from reading The Iliad, or for that matter the Old Testament. Together with Shakespearean tragedies and Godfather movies and much else.
Mukharji:
Surely reading Shakespeare is different than like shooting people on a screen, right?
Pinker:
Not necessarily because in Shakespeare you have a lot of violence that is presented as justified, and that gives you satisfaction. The data show that video games have skyrocketed in popularity during exactly the historical period in which violent crime has sunk to the floor. And in the same age cohorts.
I don’t think it’s because that we have some hydraulic urge to violence that has to be channeled through one conduit less than burst out into another, but it is, so it partly these are independent about developments.
Partly the beneficial effect of video games may just be that if you’re playing video games you’re not getting into trouble in other ways. And so the young men who are behind the screen are not out picking fights in bars or over parking spots.
Source
I hope you could minimize the background noise, kinda annoying.
In before the Internet rampaging of pissed liberal arts students who hate gamers
This has to be one of the worst surviving narratives about media.
Why does no-one ever suggest that people will repeat the positive things they see in media? It's only ever the negative things.
Everyone knows video games cause sexism, not violence. /sarcasm
Steven Pinker, you should really try and play battlefield 1 or some other new game and then speak about how it is not desensitising
playing violent video games not that different from reading Shakespeare? did i hear that right?
Tech is ahead of humanity – period. In a world where computer/tech was intended to be better connected – and in business it IS amazing – on a social level, overall sense of lonliness has gone way up among people. (this is not my opinion, this is well researched fact). The art of language, conversation and human connection has INDEED taken a hit. As far as video games are concerned, well, there are many cases where it's an addiction that has compromised an individuals life, and relationships. Now, if you are creating these games and getting paid…at least you have the income benefit. But those not in that situation…well, that's who I'm referring to most. It can be and in large numbers IS a huge addiction and problematic – but certainly not with everyone.