Do Violent Video Games Influence Youth Violence
Noel Averruz
EN1420
ITT-Technical Institute

Ever Since Violent Video Games were invented People have been trying to prove that they influence Violence in Juveniles. Although many prospective studies have been done on video game violence and the affect they have on the youth, none have been able to completely validate the claim that violent video games do influence the youth to become violent in their everyday lives.
Out of the many studies that have been done to examined video game violence and the influences it has on player aggression none of the results necessarily tap well into serious aggression or violence. One of these studies was performed by Dr. Ferguson who recruited 302 mainly Hispanic youth between the ages of 10 and 14 years. Dr. Ferguson recruited these youth from some of the most at risk areas for these youth which included places that had neighborhood problems like gangs and rebellion against authority figures. The youth were interviewed twice, once at the beginning of the study and the second time 1 year later. Dr. Ferguson took many variables into consideration like exposure to violence through violent video games and violent TV shows and movies. He also took into consideration the effects of negative life events, negative relationships with adults, negative or delinquent peers. Dr. Ferguson also looked at the youth’s life at home. He took into account how the youth’s communicated with their parents and other family members. He also took into account how much exposure the youth had to domestic violence at home. His results showed that 75% of young people played within a month of the study’s beginning and that out of those 75% only 40% played violent video games. It also showed that boys were more likely than girls to play violent video games. 12 months after only 7% of the youth reported having