this did not happen when Nintendo and Sega were the only kids on the block!

My understanding is that there is a heightened level of aggression immediately after playing violent games because people are in a survivalistic "fight! kill!" mindset during the game, but it quickly dissipates.

Yes and no. You're right, that this is visible, and these short-term-effects are usually cited as "'proof", that video-games are bad. NAturally someone playing an agressive game reacts more aggressive than someone hearing relaxing music directly adfter playing/hearing.

A long-term-effect may alos be present, but that is much harder to show. Long-term-effects may be induced by other stuf and it may be possible that videogames (or other media) only strengthens preexisting characteristics of the person. Hard to say. As this guy say: no simple yes-no-answer.

I think it's going to be near impossible to show a long term effect because there are so many more variables in such a study.

In the meanwhile the problem is that there is an overwhelming desire for a quick, cut and dry answer. Gamers simply want their hobby to be exonerated completely, and the media can't get enough of the sensationalistic "VIDEO GAMES KILL AGAIN!!!!" storyline.

Yes, I agree completely.

This is complete bullshit. He even acknowledges that there are millions of cases of people who play violent video games but dismisses it because they come from good household environments, have no mental issues etc. But the minute someone has issues outside of those, its a contributing factor, really?

If vidoegames are teaching mass shooters to aim for the head, then everyone should play videogames, as that's a shitty ass place to aim a gun at people.

Centermass is more likely to hit and kill.  That's why real soldiers always aim for dead center.

I think this would be less of an issue for gamers if these kind of studies were conducted with other forms of media or possible factors that possibly encourage violent behavior.

Are there many studies on the effects of violent movies, violent TV, violent music (it exist), violent books, comics, news, sports such as boxing and football? The answer is simply NO there is not.

Video games are getting the short end of the stick compared to other media nowadays , most likely a result of it being the youngest.

All i know is that at my school the people who played football were far more violent then the people who played GTA.

Yes, really. It can't be ruled out at this point as a contributing factor.

I mean, I think this guy is a douche for saying that society (i.e., gubmint) should do all it can to stop such a travesty from ever happening again even after admitting that millions of people play such games without issue. These incidents are rare enough that we don't need to lose all sense of perspective and have the national freakout every goddamn time, and at a certain point the prescribed cure becomes worse than the disease. But at the same time it's certainly possible that a person with a clinical mental illness could be more likely to commit real acts of violence after playing violent games.

What we forget is that mass-shootings take planning, and a LOT of planning, or else its not going to become a mass shooting. You have to pick your venue and arm yourself carefully. This sort of thing does not play into the short-term fight-or-flight high that might be caused by violent games or violent sports or any especially stimulating activity. Mass shootings are an inherently cold-blooded, sociopathic events.

Now could someone with pre-existing sociopathic tendencies play violent video games and be inspired to recreate a particularly gruesome scenario? Probably, but the psychological cause-and-effect isn't there. Violent people may be attracted to violent or faux-violent activities, but such activities don't cause violence, or else we'd have more shooters come from sports like football and hockey.