Get Psyched!

Wow Dr. Bushman excellent overview!

The new argument that the violent video game industry is using is that violent video games must be harmless because the violent crime rate has gone down since 1990. True, but this argument fails to take into account the huge increase in the incarceration rate.

Considering the enormous amount of violence that children have been exposed to over the past 50 years, it is not surprising that from the early 1960s to the mid-1970s the homicide rate increased 100%, and stayed very high until 1990. And it is not surprising that the homicide rate has now fallen back to the early 1960s rate considering the 500% increase in the incarceration rate.

http://tvsmarter.wordpress.com/2012/01/15/do-violent-video-games-reduce-...

Terry

This remind of the anecdote that the percentage of soldiers who are willing to pull a trigger to end someone else's life is nowadays pretty much 100 whereas it used to less than half that.

Great article. I would like to emphasize one point. My experience with high risk youth is that the negative impact is even higher among those youth already predisposed to react aggressively. Now we know the problem, what is the answer, I wonder.
Dr. Kathy