During the Olympics closing ceremony in Rio de Janeiro yesterday, Shinzo Abe, the prime minister of Japan who will be hosting the next summer Olympics in 2020, had impressively surprised international audiences by appearing as a Super Mario, according to A Morning Surprise for Japan: Shinzo Abe as Super Mario. His presence exceeded everyone's expectations.
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My Yes/No question is:
Do video games cause negative effects to children behaviors ?
My answer is:
No, you can't blame it all on video games.
Support
This picture of Abe standing amidst the drizzling rain with a bright red cap on his head and a red ball in his hands during the closing ceremony of Rio Olympic yesterday really made my day. Japan has never failed to impress me when it comes to creativity and innovation. The emergence of modern pop culture in late 80s combined with its traditional legacy have shaped Japan into what it is today: the country where pop culture has been transmitted successfully through manga, music, animation and video games.
I think every 90's kid cannot manage to grow up without having any idea of Super Mario. It is also one of the classic video games I have grown up with. I was just like other ordinary kids. I like playing video games. During school break, I played all kind of games, from a kiddy game like Pacman to a popular shooting game among boys like Counter-strike. Definitely, my mom was not happy with this. She tried to come up with every solution to prevent her child from playing all kind of video game for the fear that I might become addicted. One of her solution is she did not allow me to own any game devices until I can pay them myself, giving the reason that playing video game is a waste of time and it's a cause of aggressive behavior in children. The point she raised was fair enough. I bitterly accepted it but it was still confused me why such certain "hobby" was a villain here.
Personally, I see a lot of advantages of playing video game. It helps improving concentration as it requires us to focus on the tasks as well as stimulating creativity in children. I, myself, can also learn difficult English vocabularies without knowing it by playing RPG or a roleplaying game which we need to follow the storyline of each game character. In contrary, the fact that I enjoy playing shooting game doesn't mean that I enjoy being savage or seeing real people get killed. I don't think video game has anything to do with our behavior nor it provokes aggressive instinct in children. Yet, the effect on health is another topic to be concerned. Just like any other entertainments, moderate consumption and self-control are the answer to every problems. Even too much of good things can harm you. So I think stereotyping and rush conclusion are not the fair point for blaming everything to video games.
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Reference
Rich, M.A Morning Surprise for Japan: Shinzo Abe as Super Mario. (August 22, 2016). The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/23/world/asia/shinzo-abe-super-mario-tokyo-rio-olympics.html?_r=0
I really agree with you. Parent and the media nowadays are blaming games for making kid addictive to it. However, there are many things kid can get addict to it such as sport, girl or even learning. It is not a video game fault but it is parent fault for no caring their child properly. I have learned A lot of hard English vocabulary from game and I find it easier to learn through game than to sit and try to remember them all. Although there are many benefits for gaming, the main purpose of game is to entertain us and it really do their job.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, Phu. Gaming is a good way to learn something. Study shows that gamers have similar brain activity to pianists when they were playing game. It is an easy way to keep your brain active. In addition, kids learn new things when they were playing game as well. For instance, FPS shooting games might have some references to World War, or famous civil wars. This encourages the children to remember important facts, or the story that benefit them when they were taking history class.
DeleteFor those that think some games such as GTA make people becoming more aggressive, the problem is not at the game per se. The problem is that the player cannot distinguish between virtual world and reality. In this part, I think we should question the effectiveness of our educational system.
I support playing game. The benefits are noticeable. Half an hour of gaming a day will improve your life.
Although I didn't read Mieng's chosen article, the photo of Abe did catch my eye when I was browsing the NYT a couple of days ago. It must have been on their front page.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Mieng and Phu: although plausible to many parents and older people, I'm not sure that the evidence supports the idea that video games are harmful to kids, even violent, sex filled games. In a famous US Supreme Court ruling a couple of years ago, the justices ruled that a Californian law intended to restrict sales of violent games to kids was unconstitutional, with part of their argument being the lack of solid evidence of any harm caused by such games. I'm not sure that I like violent video games full or killing, rape and so on, but I'm pretty sure that my personal likes and dislikes are not a good reason to ban anything: if they were, pukey milk chocolate, a lot of popular TV, instant coffee, religions, and KFC would be banned, along with most modern pop music and all K-pop boy bands.
I am not sure if the video games have negative effect on children behavior because normally I play a quite kiddy games like Pacman, The sims and Candy Crush. I don't think they affect my behavior and it helps me a lot to relieve stress. Also, I agree that we can learn new vocabulary from the games too.
ReplyDeleteBut games have a negative effect on my health. This is because when I have become addicted to it, I will play it all days all night without doing any active activities. Staring at the screen all the time impacts on my shorten eye sight and sitting all days hurts my back. Anyway I still love playing games.
I totally agree with you Mieng. It's not the fair point to suddenly blame everything about the video games. There are many advantages and disadvantages; it's depended on how you play them. I mean that you must be responsible to do other things, such as homeworks, your works, paying attention to study, and you can play the video games. When I was young, I also played Super Mario and other games (especially CRASH Bandicoot) with my sister. I played it until I forgot to have a meal, played almost all day and everyday when my school closed in summer), and I was aggressive in sometime; I had argued with my mom and then she hit me. But when I grow up, I don't play any games (even Pokemon Go) and I can't explain myself why I wouldn't like to play video games.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that video games doesn't cause negative effects to children behaviors. Normally, the negative effect to children behaviors depend on the way that parents look after their child. Parents would be an example to their child. If they represent good behavior, their children might be follow too. Not only the good way to look after children is important but also spending time with each others is substantial too; for example, having enough time to play with children.
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