The times when video games were considered a niche phenomenon of a few basement-dwelling nerds are long gone. Games have become a mass medium, appealing to children and adults alike. The gaming geeks of the 70s and 80s have since grown up and have started families of their own, often without losing passion for their favorite pastime. It is not uncommon today that adult men and women regularly play video games with their spouses and kids. This is likely one of the reasons why the gaming industry has become the highest-grossing entertainment industry in the world.
Yet, many people still have reservations about video games, especially in more conservative circles. Christians are especially aware of the fact that just because something is culturally mainstream, it does not mean that it is good and wholesome. So how should Christians think about video games?
One major worry is that games may lead to addiction, social isolation, and even depression. The risk of developing a kind of pathological gaming addiction is most pronounced when it comes to online gaming. Even though some researchers have argued that excessive gaming should be seen as a symptom of an underlying psychological condition like depression, the American Psychological Association has included the “Internet Gaming Disorder” in its current fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5).[1] The name “Internet Gaming Disorder” is somewhat misleading because the description of the disorder explicitly includes addiction to offline games. In South Korea and China, online gaming addiction is considered a major threat to adolescents. In August 2021, the Communist government in China even passed a law that prohibits minors from playing online games for more than three hours a week.[2] However, despite it being classified as an official disorder, it remains unclear how widespread the problem actually is, especially in the West.[3]
But even if games are not the source of a major addiction problem, couldn’t they still cause many psychological and social problems among children? Andrew Przybylski, professor of psychology at the University of Oxford and head of the Oxford “Internet Institute,” has done extensive research into these questions. In a large cross-sectional study published in 2014, Przybylski analyzed the connection between the gaming behavior of around 5,000 British children (age ten to fifteen) and their “psychosocial adjustment.” The concept of psychosocial adjustment encompasses life satisfaction, socially acceptable behavior, as well as mental health. Przybylski found that the psychosocial adjustment of children who spent between one and three hours a day playing video games did not differ from the psychosocial adjustment of their peers who did not play any games at all.
Only children who played video games for less than an hour a day and those who played for more than three hours a day differed slightly from non-gamers: those with less-than-average gaming time had better psychosocial adjustment scores than non-gamers, while those who played more than the average one to three hours scored worse.[4] Przybylski’s research sits quite well with common sense, which is also what Christian virtue ethics tends to align with. The ethical lesson we can draw from this study on gaming and psychosocial adjustment seems to be quite simple and almost trivial: one should practice temperance and show moderation in gaming, just as one should regarding all things.
Even if Przybylski’s research might alleviate some of the fears about the social effects of gaming, there is still an even bigger worry that has to do with violence. Many games display violent acts in a very graphic manner. And some games even seem to outright glorify violent, destructive, and criminal behavior. The immensely popular Grand Theft Auto series, or GTA, is a case in point. It has repeatedly faced allegations of causing real-life crimes. After the number of carjackings had risen to over 1,400 in Chicago in 2020, more than double the number of cases in the previous year, Rep. Marcus Evans Jr., a Democratic member of the Illinois House of Representatives, blamed Grand Theft Auto V (2013), the latest installment of the series, for this severe uptick. Carjacking is indeed an integral part of the GTA series, which has been around since 1997. Evans went on to introduce a bill that would have banned the sale of games that encourage physically or mentally harmful acts.[5] In the end, however, the bill fell through.
The worry that fictional depictions can negatively influence real-life behavior is not new but dates back at least to ancient Greece. Plato famously warned that the depiction of depraved people and immoral actions could corrupt morals.[6] He believed that there was a particular risk for those who actively imitated such depictions. In The Republic, Socrates asks his interlocutor Adeimantus whether the latter had “not observed that imitations, if continued from youth far into life, settle down into habits and (second) nature in the body, the speech, and the thought?”[7] This issue becomes even more pressing with video games, since one of their characteristic features, which distinguishes them from novels and movies, is that the player actively imitates certain actions by performing them within a fictional game world. Shouldn’t gamers therefore better heed Socrates’s warning and refrain from imitating evil acts altogether?
The decisive question is, of course, whether the playful imitation of immoral acts and their underlying attitudes leads a person to internalize those attitudes and makes him more likely to commit those acts in real life. This is an empirical question that must be answered with the help of empirical data. One of the many alarming claims regularly circulated by the media is that there is a correlation between violent games and increased aggression. One of the studies often cited for this claim is a 2000 paper by Craig Anderson and Karen Dill.[8] It is worth taking a closer look at this study, for it is emblematic of the methodological and conceptual problems of laboratory experiments concerned with video games, aggression, and violence.
The subjects of this study were randomly assigned one of two games. One of the games was Myst (1993), a slow-paced and violence-free game centered around exploration and solving puzzles. The other one was the first-person shooter Wolfenstein 3D (1993). In this game, the player controls the American super-solider B. J. Blazkowicz who has to gun down hordes of Nazi henchmen. The selection of these two particular games is highly questionable, simply because they are dissimilar in too many ways. Let us suppose that one were to measure an increase in “aggressive feelings” (we will come to the problem of definitions soon) after playing one game but not after playing the other. How could one be certain that such an increase is due to the exposure of fictional violence and not to the fact that one game is fast-paced and action-laden while the other one is not? Instead of selecting a game like Myst, it would have been wiser to choose a fast and exciting but harmless one like the racing game Mario Kart 64.[9]
But there are also other serious problems with this experiment. After fifteen minutes, the video game session was stopped and the subjects were told that they had to compete against another person in the next room. The goal of this competition was simply to press a button faster than the opponent. At the beginning of each of the twenty-five rounds to be played, both players were to determine the duration and intensity of a noise blast their opponents would be exposed to in case they lost the round. In reality, however, there was no opponent. Rather, each subject won thirteen and lost twelve times. The real point of the competition was to find out how the subjects would determine their noise blasts based on their preceding video game experience.
The researchers defined four indicators of aggression:
1. the duration of the noise blast after winning the round
2. the duration of the noise blast after losing the round
3. the intensity of the noise blast after winning the round
4. the intensity of the noise blast after losing the round.[10]
Surprisingly, only one of these four indicators—the duration of the noise blast after a lost round—produced a result that differed sufficiently from mere chance and could therefore be considered statistically significant: on average, the subjects who had played Wolfenstein 3D chose a longer noise blast after a defeat than the Myst players did. This was the only difference between those who had played Myst and those who had engaged with Wolfenstein 3D.
Instead of addressing the fact that three of the four indicators proved to be insignificant, the authors went on to focus on this single significant correlation—or at least on what they believed to be one. For Christopher J. Ferguson, a psychologist specializing in video games, has pointed out that the study by Anderson and Dill contains a serious statistical error. If the same set of data is subjected to different analyses, it is necessary to perform a statistical adjustment called the Bonferroni correction in order to exclude non-significant random results. According to Ferguson, if a Bonferroni correction had been applied correctly by Anderson and Dill, all four results would have been recognized as non-significant.[11]
In addition to these methodological weaknesses, the study by Anderson and Dill also suffers from a conceptual problem. The crucial question is how one should define terms like “aggression” and “aggressive behavior.” The study uses the following definition: “Aggressive behavior is operationally defined as the intensity and duration of noise blasts the participant chooses to deliver to the opponent.”[12] This means that, in effect, the experiment examined the willingness of the test persons to use harmless noise blasts against their opponents as part of a reaction game. The problem is obvious: this concept of aggressive behavior has nothing to do with the kind of real violence that parents, teachers, and politicians are concerned about when they talk about the negative consequences of video games. Psychologists Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl K. Olson, who conducted a large-scale research project on the effects of video games, have also drawn attention to this problem. They have pointed out that a test person who triggers a short noise blast in the course of a game can hardly be assumed to have the same malicious intent as someone who shoots a store clerk during a robbery or stabs a fellow human being in the course of a bar fight.[13]
However, there are indeed some studies that have demonstrated statistically significant correlations between video games with violent content and “aggression.” Such correlations have been found in studies within laboratory settings, long-term studies, as well as cross-sectional studies.[14] However, correlation and causality are not the same thing. Furthermore, “aggression” does not mean dangerous or even homicidal violence in any of these studies. Finally, even where correlations were found, they were not particularly pronounced. In fact, the higher the methodological quality of a study was, the lower the strength of the measured effects.[15]
So, while there is no consensus among psychologists about the relation between video games and violence, a sober and balanced look at the empirical research does not allow for any alarmism. As Ferguson has pointed out, “the debate on video game violence has been reduced to whether video game violence produces no effects . . . or almost no effects.”[16] The world’s largest association of psychologists, the American Psychological Association, has therefore declared that “attributing violence to violent video gaming is not scientifically sound and draws attention away from other factors.”[17]
Even though there is no one-to-one causal relationship between violent video games and violent criminal behavior, it would be foolish to believe that games have no effect at all on those who engage with them. Humans are cultural beings in the double sense that they do not only shape their cultural surroundings but that they are in turn also shaped by them. Video games are part of culture and thus also part of the general process through which norms and values are not only expressed but also learned. Catholics have become especially sensitive to this fact since mainstream culture has shifted away more and more from the norms, values, and virtues of the Catholic faith. Our souls are nourished by what we see, read, and hear. And it is simply common sense that there are things that might be legal but that Catholics should not engage in. This is especially true for children and young people whose character has not yet been fully formed.
Obviously, going on a virtual killing spree in any of the Grand Theft Auto games is not a violation of the fifth commandment because no real persons are being harmed. Despite this, Catholics should pay close attention to their souls and be ready to ask some untimely and uncomfortable questions: is it beneficial for my soul and my relation with God to spend my time playing games like GTA? Can I be sure that I will not nourish any sinful proclivities through simulating evil?
The biggest danger of video games, however, is the cultural normalization of attitudes and behaviors that contradict Christian morality and that might slowly warp one’s perception of what is true and good. A recent example of this potential danger is the massively successful action-adventure game The Last of Us Part II (2020). At its core, it is a fascinating game about the dangerous allure of violence and the senselessness of revenge. However, it also contains some controversial themes on sexuality and gender. The protagonist Ellie is in a lesbian relationship with a bisexual girlfriend who, as it turns out as the game unfolds, is pregnant by her ex-boyfriend. There is also a transgender non-player character who no longer wants to be called Lily but Lev instead, and who is being chased by religious fanatics. The game successfully advocates a worldview precisely because it presents its ideas on sexual ethics and gender identity so matter-of-factly.
As this example shows, video games are not necessarily just games. As cultural artifacts, they can impact society and its beliefs. Yet, even though one should foster a critical attitude toward video games, it is important to recognize that there is a huge variety of games, ranging from mindless trash to good entertainment to works of remarkable artistic quality. It is also important to recognize that video games are not mere child’s play. The desire to play is deeply inscribed into human nature. The philosopher John Finnis has identified play as one of the fundamental human goods, i.e. a “basic aspect of human well-being.”[18]
To play means to be active in a special way. Ordinarily, our actions are merely means to an end: we work to earn money, we do the laundry to have clean clothes, we go shopping to stock our fridges, and so on. Games are different, insofar as they are typically played for the sake of playing. Whatever benefits or negative consequences playing a game might have, these effects are only accidental. The true end of a game lies in itself. Thus, playing a game is essentially a form of leisure. Leisure, however, is not mere idleness or laziness. Rather, leisure means having the time to do things for their own sake. As the Catholic philosopher Josef Pieper has pointed out, leisure is at the root of all higher culture which is created and practiced for its own sake.[19] This is also the sense in which the theologian Romano Guardini has declared the Catholic liturgy to be a “sacred game.”[20]
Games, including video games, can be a form of leisure. Thus, they are pointless but meaningful, or perhaps even more to the point: they are meaningful precisely because they are pointless. Therefore, despite all the above-mentioned perils of virtual violence and the promotion of wrong-headed ideologies, playing (good) video games can be a pointlessly meaningful activity that is valuable in itself.
[1] See Lawrence Kutner/Cheryl Olson, Grand Theft Childhood, New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008, 156–161.
[2] Sofia Brooke, “What to Make of the New Regulations in China’s Gaming Industry,” in China Briefing, 16.11.2021.
[3] American Psychological Association, DSM-5, p. 797.
[4] Andrew K. Przybylski, “Electronic gaming and psychosocial adjustment,” in Pediatrics 134 (3), 2014, e716-e722.
[6] Plato, Republic X, 595a–608b.
[7] Ibid., III 395c–d (trans. Paul Shorey).
[8] Craig Anderson/Karen Dill, “Video games and aggressive thoughts, feelings and behavior in the laboratory and in life,” in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 78, 2000, pp. 772-790.
[9] See Kutner/Olson, Grand Theft Childhood, p. 72.
[10] Anderson/Dill, “Video games and aggressive thoughts,” p. 786.
[11]Christopher J. Ferguson, “Blazing Angels or Resident Evil? Can Violent Video Games Be a Force for Good?” in Review of General Psychology 14/2, 2010, p. 73.
[12] Anderson/Dill, “Video games and aggressive thoughts,” p. 784.
[13] Kutner/Olson, Grand Theft Childhood, p. 65.
[14] American Psychological Association, “Task Force Report on Violent Video Games”, October 2019, www.apa.org/science/leadership/bsa/report-violent-video-games.pdf
[15] Christopher J. Ferguson, “Do Angry Birds Make for Angry Children? A Meta-Analysis of Video Game Influences on Children’s and Adolescents’ Aggression, Mental Health, Prosocial Behavior, and Academic Performance”, in: Perspectives on Psychological Science 10/5, 2015, pp. 655ff.
[16] Ferguson, “Blazing Angels or Resident Evil?”, p. 74.
[17] American Psychological Association, “Resolution on Violent Video Games”. See also Kutner/Olson, Grand Theft Childhood, pp. 8-11.
[18] John Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights, second edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 87.
[19] Josef Pieper, Leisure: the Basis of Culture, introduction by Roger Scruton, new translation by Gerald Malsbary, South Bend: St. Augustine’s Press, 1998.
[20] Romano Guardini, The Spirit of the Liturgy, translated by Ada Lane, Providence: Cluny Media, 2018.
