Comments for The Good and Bad Effects of Video Games http://www.raisesmartkid.com Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:49:49 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.2 http://www.raisesmartkid.com/index.php?option=com_content"&"task=view"&"id=53"&"Itemid=38#pc_7 Hi I had to write a paper for school on the pros and cons of video games effects on childre. I agree that the benefits out wight the negative. After considering different topics for my paper, one clearly turned the light bulb that humans like to refer as when thinking of ideas or questions. Having to deal with two beautiful daughters, nieces, nephew, and small little brother, I could not stop thinking how much time they spend in front of a television playing video games. What are the effects of video games on children? To fully understand the impact and the consequences that video games have on children I looked at different sources in the internet but I couldn’t depend on other people research, so I asked my nieces, nephew, and brother what they thoughts was on video games. After walking in the untarnished minds of the children lots of obvious questions were answered but to my surprise some unexpected ones too. Asserting to the fact that video games are able to have several positive effects, it should come as no surprise that they also can have negative effects. Research has documented negative effects of video games on children's physical health, including obesity, video-induced seizures. And postural, muscular and skeletal disorders, such as tendonitis, nerve compression, and carpal tunnel syndrome. However, these effects are not likely to occur for most children. The research to date suggests that parents should be most concerned about two things: the amount of time that children play, and the content of the games that they play. Given the expert opinion and results of their research they are not much different than the results of my own experiment. Here are some pros according to the children: It can exercise your finger and you can have fun too. There are girls’ games like Hannah Montana and boys games like sonic heroes. I guess they are trying to say that the choices of games are available to all genders. Video games can teach some skills that help to analyze and answer question and riddles, skills that can improve reasoning skills even though some games aren’t very reasonable. There are even games that focus specifically on education and making learning fun. Shooting, war and maybe driving games help to improve hand-eye coordination, by measuring the distances of targets or goals. May I express that fun was the overall consensus among the children. Video games cons according to the children are like volcanoes in the world, not many. To start they stated that video games can be addictive; your fingers can hurt and get sore. Some of us will lose some social ability and not get enough exercise from always staying inside and playing video games instead of going out and play. “Instead of playing three hours you should play for thirty minutes. You should never play on school night because it messes with your brain and you won’t focus on school work”, said by the ten year old niece. To my troubled surprise the seven year old nephew said, “You can get in trouble and you will get dizzy and you will not know what people are saying”. I have learned that there is a thin line that we as parents and the children have to walk in order to balance the unavoidable monster created by the video games creators. Used in moderation, the advantages can be very helpful. The negative effects are found with excessive play, so the benefits may outweigh any possible negative impact if the time spent is kept within reasonable limits. Like my mother once said, “Eat enough to the point of sustainment and avoid the temptation of gluttony”. Tue, 02 Dec 2008 22:40:04 +0100