The Economist printed an interesting article last week that gathers some recent research on the behavioral effects of video games.

The first bit of research focused on what the researchers called “pro-social” gaming. Dr. Douglas Gentile studies the effects of gamers after playing games from one of two groups. The first group involved fighting and destructive games and the second were games in which the player assists other characters. (A third group of games were the control – puzzle games.)

…those who spent the longest playing games which involved helping others were most likely to help, share, co-operate and empathise with others. They also had lower scores in tests for hostile thoughts and the acceptance of violence as normal.

Tobias Greitemeyer and Silvia Osswald followed the thinking in  Dr. Gentile’s research and focused even more on positive gaming leading to positive thoughts.

…the students were asked to say what happens next in three incomplete stories involving a driver and a cyclist who narrowly miss colliding; two friends, one of whom is unapologetic despite being repeatedly late; and a diner speaking to a restaurant manager after waiting for an hour to be served and then having food spilt on him. Those who had played “Lemmings” suggested endings in which the characters in the stories exhibited significantly fewer aggressive thoughts, responses and actions than the ones suggested by the “Tetris” players.

The conclusion drawn is that video games in which the player is rewarded for assisting other characters tend to result in players to act positivly in real life social situations.  Games with violence, or where you harm characters, resulted in players acting in anti-social ways.

Some of the comments are thought provoking.  One claims that the researchers should have picked more current and mainstream games to test with.  Others argue that other societal factors, such as the current state of the economy, are more likely the cause of violent behavior.

Photo by Helico – Licensed under Creative Commons (Thanks to Tim S. for sending this in)