When looking at the debate over video games being a problem in today's society and supposedly causing violence within children, people tend to overlook what positive outcomes can come from playing video games. Not only are they an excellent source of entertainment, but the public is unaware of many benefits that come from playing video games. Some of the benefits are increased hand-eye coordination, reasoning skills, problem-solving skills and many more that this paper will emphasize. Therefore, are video games like other forms of entertainment in that, when used in moderation they have positive effects? For example, going out for a beer with friends occasionally is fine and loaded with fun, only when someone is drinking every night or drinking irresponsibly does it becomes a problem. The same goes for playing video games: playing in moderation is fun and entertaining, but playing out of moderation or irresponsibly letting minors play mature rated games creates problems that change the gaming experience. Therefore, when played in moderation, video games are beneficial, lack negative effects, and serve as another safe hobby. This is important because proving gaming is beneficial reduces the legitimacy of issues blamed on the participation in video games. 

Video games have historically had negative effects researched, when there are actually many beneficial aspects to video games that researchers fail to mention. When looking at a survey I administered to people who include gaming in their daily lives, 98% believe video games increase hand/eye coordination, 97% believe they increase problem solving skills and reasoning skills. Hughes also mentions each of those benefits, along with learning "strategy and anticipation, management of resources (simulation games), mapping, pattern recognition, how to judge the situation, practice reading, multitasking, quick thinking, creativity and quantitative calculations." People who took the survey also noted they were able to meet many people through gaming, including through the game itself, gaming communities, and midnight releases, etc. Through the gamers, constantly having to decide whom to accept as a friend and how to lead a group or clan, there is a learning opportunity for prosocial behavior and improvement of social skills (Granic 73). All of these are learning outcomes and in ways self-improvement from playing video games. Video games also offer a strong social interaction between other people and opening the ability to play with many others. Overall showing that there are many personal, social, and self-improvement benefits from playing video games.

Video games can also help with serious issues like depression, anxiety and other mental illnesses that affect a larger group of people. In the conducted survey, 95% believed video games do not cause depression or anxiety, and the majority believed video games could also help the illnesses. A few examples of video games helping someone with mental illnesses were testimonies given by Peter and the father of a child with autism in the survey conducted. Peter explained that he had been depressed for about two to three years, along with being disabled. He explains that playing video games gave him a reason to want to get up in the morning and eventually helped pull him out of his multiple yearlong depression. This is just one of many examples of the benefits video games have and how they can serve as more than just an entertainment source. Doctors and psychologists could use video games to help with multiple illnesses if they would take the time to experiment on how it can help the patients. The parent speaking for their ten-year-old child that has autism said that the video games help calm him down. The psychologist believes it can help him because of the repetitiveness of the games giving him a sense of routine. If video games helped these people with their mental illnesses, could they not help others if psychologist informed them of the possible benefits of playing?

Along with video games helping people on an individual basis, they also have become widespread in government forces to help with teaching and learning. Video games are useful to military forces through simulations, drills and practice games to teach along with simulators to train pilots (Squire 4). Some researchers also believe that video games could help make information technology (IT) knowledge transferrable (Griffiths 48). This would be very useful because IT is a rapidly growing industry with the increase in technology, and the knowledge would be very beneficial because of how unique and high-tech their knowledge is. The medical field also has incorporated video games into some of their practices to help teach patients about their illnesses and prevention methods. One very important example of this is the video game designed for child cancer patients called Re-Mission. The game consists of a robot that shoots cancer cells, overcomes bacterial infections and manages common side effects of the cancer treatments. Developers created the game to teach children with cancer how to deal with their cancer. Researchers conducted a study on the success of the game to find that the overall knowledge of cancer was much greater in the Re-Mission players, than those who played a different game (Granic 73). The game has now become widely distributed and the success of this implementation shows just how powerful and useful video games can be. If more government forces and medical fields incorporated and used video games more frequently in their procedures and teaching, these benefits could become more widespread and universal. Therefore, video games are offering a proven way of effectively teaching soldiers, other government forces and medical patients on their illnesses. 

Similar to government forces and the medical field, the education system and schools are incorporating video games also; with a lot of success. Some games are educational without the schools even implementing them. A few examples being Rise of Nations and Age of Mythology both of these teach areas of science, politics, history and cultural studies (Hughes). Some games like this, including Gettysburg, SimEarth, or Railroad Tycoon, have already started appearing in K-12 classrooms because they allow students to explore the complex dynamics of micro worlds (Squire). Video games in general are a learning source, but games directed to teach a specific skill could be very beneficial. In some of the IB courses I personally took, I found that some of my video games helped me on some of the vocabulary we learned, and my programming classes used games to teach us how to code. By games allowing participants to experience novelty, curiosity and challenge along with offering elements of interactivity, they are able to stimulate learning (Griffiths). Through learning those skills through video games, it made me want to learn more, now I am in college majoring in computer science to become a programmer and program simulation training programs for the government forces. These points show how games are beneficial when used in education, they generally succeed very well at getting students to participate and most learn more from them. 

Video games can teach some of the basic skills needed to start school. This is why schools could benefit heavily, especially in the lower grades, if they advised parents of the games that could help their children prepare. Video games are able to help with language skills through, following the given directions in games, giving directions and discussing and sharing information about the game. They also can offer basic math skills by the children having to determine how to interact with the score counters. Games help with reading skills since the children have to read all the shown dialogue in the game. Lastly, they help with social skills in children. They offer them a common passion to share with other people at school along with an activity for them to do when they hang out (Griffiths). All of which are needed skills and what better way to introduce children to them other than through the luxury of a video game? Shepherd states, "A game that is engaging has been shown to induce a mindset that is both focused and happy (17)." I was introduced to the Jump Start games when I was young, and I was in advanced classes including IB throughout middle and high school and am now carrying a 4.0 GPA in college. I am a living example of how effective using video games as a method of learning can be. Showing more of how video games are beneficial. 

Even though all these benefits exist, just like other hobbies when done out of moderation there is going to be issues. Therefore, some people do not play games in moderation and make all gamers look bad and all of a sudden, video games are the center of all evil. One of the highly debated issues with video games is that they cause violence especially in children; this is where the people who are not in favor of video games tend to ignore the benefits and only consider the worst case scenarios. Hughes states that simulating violence in the video games by shooting guns and fighting tends to cause real-life violent behavior. Hughes also believes that all perpetrators of mass shootings played violent video games and that is the cause of their bad decisions. However, when looking at the statistics given by ProCon on the issue it is clearly not the case that all of them were interested in violent video games. ProCon states, "There have been 71 mass shootings  ...  seven of which (9.8%) involved shooters age 18 or younger.  ...  Millions of young people play video games full of fistfights, blazing guns, and body slams... Yet only a minuscule fraction of the consumers becomes violent. A report  ...  examined 37 incidents of targeted school violence between 1974 and 2000. Of the 41 attackers studied  ...  only 12% showed interest in violent video games." This shows that violent games are not the blame of these shootings. As Norah states in her response to the survey administered, "guns do not kill people and spoons do not make people fat. Just because a person uses an instrument to perform an act, they make the choice for themselves." A game is not going to make someone go and kill anyone, it is not a drug; it cannot physically alter your brain set. Another study done showed that playing violent video games actually offers a way to relieve anger and stress, therefore, leading to less violence in real life (ProCon). All of these sources show how video games are not the cause of violence. Some people are just naturally violent. The weapons and things that happen in video games are nothing new, for example, a bow has been around for centuries and it is a common weapon used in video games to kill people. However, it was around before, video games just incorporated it sometimes to be used to do the same as they would have been used for in real life, to hunt and gather food and to protect themselves. How then, are those video games that are making a simulation of real life actions going to cause violence if the violence portrayed is the same thing that has happened for years with alterations as time goes by? 

Going along with violence, the idea that video games incite violence in children is another major concern. Some argue that children's minds are very malleable to the things they see and therefore, violent video games make them violent. Seeing all the violence in the games and getting rewarded at times for violent actions is going to offer a viewpoint that doing it in real life is ok also. As Josh makes very clear in the survey, "video games have ratings from the ESRB for a reason". This is important because it is not the video games or the developers fault if parents let their kids less than 18 years of age play games that are clearly marked as mature audiences only. In addition, "As of Sep. 18, 2015, there was 2,178 M-rated games in the ESRB database. Of all the games rated by ESRB  ...  94% have been rated E, E10+ or T" (ProCon). Going off this statistic, only 6% of games are mature rated leaving plenty of games that would be appropriate for children of younger age. Also in the survey conducted, 92% do not believe video games cause violence, and these are all people who gaming is part of their daily lives. Another statistic that shows how video games do not cause violence especially in children, states, "Total US sales of video games  ...  increased 204%  ...  while violent crimes decreased 37% and murders by juveniles  ...  fell 76%" (ProCon). If video games were the cause of violence, how can the sales of video games increase double fold yet the violence rates decrease? If games were to blame, the crime rates should be sky rocketing with them. As Kevin states in the survey, blaming video games for children being violent is just a scapegoat for bad parents. Children watch superman, we do not have children jumping off buildings thinking they can fly. Along with that, in some of the studies done on video games causing violence in children, when the child gets upset because they take the game after only 10 minutes they consider that as becoming "violent". Nobody wants to play for 10 minutes; you are unable to get hardly anything accomplished in 10 minutes. Along with all these sources showing how they are not to blame for violence, "A new study suggests video game-playing for less than an hour a day is linked with better-adjusted children and teenagers" (University of Oxford). If playing in moderation led to better adjusted children then games cannot cause the issues in children, and are more fault of the parent for not controlling the time they played and the type of games they played. Therefore, video games are not the cause of violence in children, and if parents allow them play mature games prematurely then it is at fault of the parents.

Another major concern with video games is that they cause obesity and depression. That gamer's will lose social life playing games all the time and eventually become depressed and quit caring about their physical health. When obesity and depression come into picture for a gamer, generally they are playing out of moderation by far. The University of Oxford study found that, "those who played video games for less than an hour  ...  were associated with the highest levels of sociability and were most likely to say they were satisfied with their lives. They also appeared to have fewer friendship and emotional problems, and reported less hyperactivity than the other groups." This shows that when played in moderation, video games are not the cause of depression. However, just like all hobbies, if someone plays them out of moderation, problems are going to occur because the gamer is prioritizing games over things such as work, health, friends, etc. Obesity of course comes from playing out of moderation and the gamer not caring about what they ate or how much of it. This is just a choice on their part, every hobby can become addictive, and some people just have addictive personalities. Each person individually has to be responsible for themselves and mature enough know when to stop. 

Now that the paper has shown all the benefits of video games and all the debated negative effects of video games, are video games just another hobby? If we consider exercising, which is a hobby for some people, generally exercising is highly recommended but exercising can also become an addiction. If something highly recommended and good for you can become addicting and actually end up causing health problems, how can it be surprising that playing video games can have negative effects when done out of moderation? O'Connor states that exercise dependency is "the compulsive need to exercise that takes priority over an individual's health, relationships and other interests. If they miss a workout, a negatively addicted exerciser will experience unpleasant emotions, such as depression and guilt, as well as physical symptoms like insomnia". The only negative effect not shared between the two is obesity and that is only because exercise dependent people would ignore eating for their addiction while gamers addicted to video games would become obese because they did nothing but game. Both however when used out of moderation can lead to, addiction, social problems, depression and insomnia. Just like when exercising in moderation has many benefits including overall health, can be social activity, can be a source of stress relief and some even do it just for fun, so do video games. 

Overall, video games are most certainly just another hobby. They have many benefits, and just like all hobbies can have negative effects when done out of moderation. All of the issues debated about video games are only in cases when a gamer is playing out of moderation or parents are not properly following the rating guidelines or not monitoring the time their child spends playing. Which is nothing odd for a hobby, anything done out of moderation is going to have negative effects. Drinking too much beer, exercising too much, playing games too much, collecting too much and playing sports too much, all can have negative effects and possibly lead to issues. Some of which are easily fixed by people being mature enough do the hobbies, some issues such as possibility of concussions in sports are just risks that are taken in order enjoy what an athlete loves doing.  The overall point being, proving video games are beneficial, and to show how all the issues blamed on video games are lacking legitimacy. Also to inform teachers, and government forces of the benefits video games offer if they are integrated into teachings correctly. The overall goal being, to provide the information in hope of more institutions implementing video games and less false accusations against video games. If this could be achieved, learning will be on a new level and most likely more students able to graduate high school and college with higher grades and GPA's if they are taught more through video games. 

