[IvarTJ]

Am I misunderstanding this?

"Sustained violent video game play was significantly related to steeper increases in adolescents' trajectory of aggressive behavior over time. Moreover, greater violent video game play predicted higher levels of aggression over time, after controlling for previous levels of aggression, supporting the socialization hypothesis. In contrast, no support was found for the selection hypothesis. Nonviolent video game play also did not predict higher levels of aggressive behavior over time."

They write that they find support for the "socialization hypothesis", presumably meaning that players pick up norms from the violent games.

[lutusp]

> They write that they find support for the "socialization hypothesis", presumably meaning that players pick up norms from the violent games.

Yes, they say that, but the study offers no evidentiary support for that opinion. Scientific papers are not supposed to be soapboxes for the opinions of the researchers, only the careful reporting of scientific results. And the result of this study is that there is a correlation between aggressive behavior and video game play. Correlation is not causation. Aggressive behavior might lead to a preference of video games, or the reverse. This study cannot sort it out. And a study that did sort it out would do it by forcing people to play, or not play, video games, for an extended period. That's unethical and will never happen.

[001sky]

Correlation is not causation

You speak from experience? There is strong orthogonal logic that supports the hypothesis that simulated violence is effective in generating, inducing, and manipulating aggression in human subjects.

viz> http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4625843

[lutusp]

>> Correlation is not causation

> You speak from experience?

It's not as though I invented this idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_caus...

> There is strong orthogonal logic that supports the hypothesis that simulated violence is effective in generating, inducing, and manipulating aggression in human subjects.

There is no evidence whatsoever to support a cause-effect relationship such as you suggest. If a study were to be designed that could uncover such a relationship, it would violate experimental ethics and would not be funded.

And your link offers no scientific support whatsoever for your claim. It's an opinion piece, not a scientific study. It offers precisely zero evidence in support of its opinions.

[001sky]

That experiment was Vietnam. You need to read its main reference.

[lutusp]

> That experiment was Vietnam. You need to read its main reference.

By your definition, Vietnam was a scientific experiment? This speaks volumes about how you picture science. The plural of anecdote is not evidence.

[001sky]

You're talking yout of your ass. In preparation for vietnam, the US armed forces studied lethality of intent for small arms fire. Vietnam was the dataset, which has since been further validated. The cited text was written by a professor at west point, he's not full of shit.

Data (roughly) for effectivenes / lethal intent:

Population (normal): 5%

Soldier (WWII era): 20%

Soldier (Current Era): 95%

These are anectdotally referenced in the linked article, but they are discussed in that article's main citation, which is here:

Publication Date: November 1, 1996 | ISBN-10: 0316330116 | ISBN-13: 978-0316330114 | Edition: 1

[Amazon.com] Lt. Col. Dave Grossman draws unsettling, even sinister parallels between the psychological conditioning required to make soldiers kill in war and the similar effect that videos, films, games and movies have in civilian society.

This book is/was a textbook used in the armed forces, it is a summary of working papers etc. It is not some BS handwavey claptrap from academia. What you will notice from reading it is it is actually very difficult to get people to Kill one another.

That is why the data on effectiveness are so damning.

[jarofgreen]

> Yes, they say that, but the study offers no evidentiary support for that opinion.

Have you actually read the study in full? If your claiming that the study does not in fact prove what the abstract says it does, then you'll need to provide some more details on that.

[lutusp]

> then you'll need to provide some more details on that.

The scientific burden is not mine to show that the article reports a correlation and nothing more, the burden is on the authors to show that that they have demonstrated a cause-effect relationship. And based on their study design, they wouldn't dare -- they have no way to distinguish causes from effects, as you would know if you actually understood the article and the study it reports.

[zerostar07]

Why would it be unethical if people voluntarily agree to participate?

[lutusp]

> Why would it be unethical if people voluntarily agree to participate?

12-year-olds? The study we're discussing examines the behavior of minors. Minors cannot give the kind of consent you're suggesting.

Also, the sort of strictly designed experiments that might turn psychology into a science, are extremely expensive and not likely to be funded. The reason? Research standards in psychology are so abysmally low that a well-designed study would be so expensive by comparison that the granting agencies would refuse to fund it.

[zerostar07]

Still, one would like to test for the opposite (stopping video games -> less aggressive behaviour).

I remember as a kid we played war games outdoors, i think kids have always done that in some ways.

[arethuza]

"as a kid we played war games outdoors"

When I was a kid (70s) our "war games" were quite remarkably violent - I'm surprised that nobody got killed.

These days I watch my teenage son play rugby - which is itself rather violent (although generally very good natured) and from what I can see it is a pretty good sport for teenagers who like playing it (as my son is going to a rugby-oriented school he is lucky, it must be miserable for kids who hate rugby).

[pygy_]

Yes, their evidence sugests a causal relation.

They define socialization/selection in the abstract:

    the socialization (violent video game play predicts aggression over time) 
    versus selection hypotheses (aggression predicts violent video game play over time)

[gojomo]

Unless they're missing some other factor that drives both aggression and the gameplay choices -- a factor other than the "previous levels of aggression" they mention as being a tested control.

Perhaps, some other childhood stressor or failure in coping mechanisms? And if this other factor tends to trigger first, escapism into violent gameplaying, but then later (if unaddressed), actual aggression, I think they could see the "steeper increases in adolescents' trajectory of aggressive behavior" that's reported, even though the gameplaying is just a waypoint or signal rather than cause.

(Under this hypothesis, it's possible the violent gameplaying aggravates the underlying issue, if it delays or prevents other remedies, but it's also possible the gameplaying serves to soften the aggression. You can't really tell from their sequenced relations analysis... you'd want some stronger random-like control on the amount of violent gameplaying.)

[jarofgreen]

> Unless they're missing some other factor

From Abstract: "and a comprehensive set of potential 3rd variables were included as covariates in each analysis".

Sounds like they certainly tried to control for that - you'd have to read the full study to see the details.

[gojomo]

Yes, too bad the full text is behind a paywall. So I haven't read the full study, but I was once upon a time a teenager.

I recall many aspects of my and my peer's psychological lives that would not be easily available to an outside researcher as part of their "comprehensive set of potential 3rd variables".