The Mental Emotional Health Blog

Research studies are useful, even necessary in studying psychological trends. Then I see results of studies (or the reporting of them) like the one listed below that make me groan. The title of a short article in the Chicago Tribune from March 2, 2009, stated: Video game violence warnings make kids more likely to want to play, study says. The link is here for the full article: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/technology/chi-talk-gamesmar02,0,4702900.story .

The title itself had me annoyed as a therapist and as a parent, and the first actual sentence in the article didn’t help: If you want to make blood-and-gore video games less appealing to minors, toss those restrictive age and violent-content warnings. The lure of something off-limits only increases demand, a new study says. This is a perfect example of putting emphasis in the wrong place. Warnings are just that: warnings to people who are responsible enough to use them effectively, especially in parenting. The article goes on to suggest that kids should not buy their own video games (I think that is obvious), and the parents should monitor risk factors such as grades dropping (I think that is also obvious). But the last suggestion is that policy-makers rethink (implying ”drop”) the Mature Rating Classification: which will only make the games “unspeakably desirable.”

The bottom line is it doesn’t matter how much a child/teen wants a video game. If a parent is informed about the content of a video game, the parent is in a better position to make decisions about its appropriateness. It is up to parents to stay informed, and warnings are a simple and effective way to keep them informed. Also, there are responsible teens out there that do take it upon themselves to check the ratings and warnings on their own.

The restrictions suggested by the ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) provide both age appropriateness and content description. The ESRB link is below, and is a good resource for parents since a video game search is on the main page: http://www.esrb.org/ratings/ratings_guide.jsp . Another good link is from PBS: http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolution/impact/esrb.html .

I have added some links to articles that reported how parents can benefit from the ratings system:

•  http://www.xboxsolution.com/2003/12/06/study-shows-parents-approve-of-video-game-ratings/
• http://www.dmwmedia.com/news/2004/11/22/study-parents-find-video-game-ratings-highly-accurate
• http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/11-22-2004/0002496229&EDATE=

Removing warnings of the content in video games would allow teens and children to keep parents in the dark about what they are playing. But more important is the fact that parents and guardians have the right and responsibility to determine what is appropriate for their kids, regardless of how much the kids want to play certain games.