14 DAY TRIAL // A new report coming from the Ohio State University shows that playing cooperative video games like Call of Duty and Halo has resulted in increased cooperative behavior in real world situation at a later date and an overall decrease in the aggressive behavior of those involved.
The report included two studies.
The first one saw students playing Halo 2 for 20 minutes in separate rooms with four types of conditions: playing cooperatively against aliens, playing against each other, playing solo and playing after completing a survey which allowed the researchers to measure their inclination towards working together.
A second study segregated players of Unreal Tournament 3 in cooperative and competitive groups with a subject who was identified either as part of the Ohio State community or as part of their rivals in Michigan.
After both initial studies ended, students were evaluated using a cooperation-oriented task which included the distribution of four dimes with the only condition being that each one given to another participant doubled in value.
David Ewoldsen, who is a professor of communication at Ohio State University, has stated, “The idea is that you can be selfish and keep your dimes or you can give them away, and if each person gives their dimes away they get more money so that’s the measure of cooperation.”
The study has showed that those who played cooperative games were more inclined to give away their dimes than those who had not.
The research shows that the content of the game matters less than the way it is being played.
Ewoldsen added, “Video games have become such an important part of adolescent socialization. Certainly the research has shown that playing violent games can have very bad effects, but it’s a much more complex relationship than that.”
The researcher also believes that studies that seek to link aggression with video game play are too simplistic and that the relation between the new form of entertainment and real world behavior is much more complex.