ro negative effects of computer games
TRANSCRIPT
NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF COMPUTER
GAMES
DOBRE CRISTINASECONDARY SPECIAL SCHOOL NO.
2, BUCHAREST
SUMMARY COMPUTER USE EFFECTS COMPUTERS IN EDUCATION COMPUTER GAMES GAMES AND EDUCATION DISCUSSION
COMPUTER USE EFFECTS Computer use harms human brain development and
function
When we sit in front of the screen, cortical activity is completely different from that typically found in front of people.
Computer affects the way the brain responds to the challenges of the real world and also the way in which it processes the information.
Passivity, lack of focus or poor thinking.
Weakness of logical and analytical thinking, of speech, sentence construction, reading and writing.
Weakens motivation and encourage instinctive behaviors - bulimia, bullying and sexual impulses.
Existential and mental challenges that man faces, environmental stimuli constitute food for brain.
The first months and years of life are more suitable for the development of cortical structure that provides vision, hearing, speech, etc. If these stimuli are lacking in specific periods, these structures or functions will remain undeveloped.
The image on the monitor screen, through a hypnotic like action, undermines the brain rhythm that characterize logical and analytical processes.
In using the computer, analysis should be customized depending on how it is used. For example, is not the same thing to read a text on the screen with a self-absorbed state that leave you in the virtual space of computer games.
In fact, precipitating factors consist in rapid changing of images and powerful elicitation of emotions and instincts.
COMPUTERS IN EDUCATION From the educational point of view, it is very important to
highlight that computers force the use of some special formal thinking and reasoning: those that can be placed into the machine in the form of orders and instructions, the user thinking being reduced to what can be interpreted by the machine.
One of the highest goals of education should be the development of logical and objective thinking ability, so as to become free and creative in adulthood. This cannot happen if thinking is framed too early into rigid and dead forms, such as those required by the computer, working on a strictly formal mental level.
Because of formal thinking and language imposed by the use of computers and also because of enormous self-control required, we conclude that the ideal age for young people to start using the computer is 16-17 years.
COMPUTER GAMES In a typical game, the earned points of a player depend
on the speed of reaction. Conscious thinking is a very slow process, and the player must react without thinking.
In other words, gaming requires automatic responses. This explains why children play much easier and much more successfully these games: they have not yet developed their own mind and conscience as mature people.
Knowing that feelings are the most active facettes in players, electronic games manufacturers, like those in television, present situations which arise strong feelings, followed by violence and challenges.
It is interesting to note that automatic reactions are characteristic for animals and not for adult human beings. In general, adults think before doing something, searching through mental representations the consequences of their actions. Internal representations are controlling human behaviors and prevent people to act on impulse. This does not happen in animals: they act immediately by impulses and environmental conditions. An animal is not thinking about the consequences of its actions. It can therefore be said that electronic games "animalise" the players.
On the other hand, because the game requires small amplitude and automatic motor actions, the player is reduced to a machine that detects small limited visual impulses and performs small and limited movements with his fingers.
GAMES AND EDUCATION Computer games players learn how to execute highly specialized
activities. But what they learn cannot be applied and used in real life. However, in emergency situations of stress or confused consciousness, players might react and conform to the game, but maneuvering real objects as something artificial. From this point of view, games are much worse than TV.
We have to mention here the tragedies occurred in some American schools, in which the conditioning and training conducted by electronic games have provoked violent, tragic events undertaken by young people using them. Very impressive is the event in Kentucky (1998): a young man of 14 years old entered a classroom and fired eight shots in the head and thorax of his victims, fire one person as if falling all targets. Analyzing the case, it is said that a good cop or soldier gets in general only 20% of targets, and often uses more than one shots for a single person. But is incredible the fact that the young boy never used a gun before, being trained to use the weapon only through the electronic games. In computer games, when turned on, you should start shooting and do not stop, otherwise the points are lost. Children killers acted like animals or even worse, as machines with fantastic precision and cold blood, without any compassion.
DISCUSSION It is therefore false the belief that computer use
develops thinking and makes the child more intelligent. This belief is based on a trend maintained by those who earn billions of dollars from the sale of games, computer software or computers in general, a trend developed in the context of the enthusiasm generated by the emergent and explosive development of computer technology in last twenty years.
Of course, the parental stress plays an important role in today's society. Parents do not have time to educate their children. It is easier to buy a computer and to let the child to spend time in front of it, especially when there is an assumption that she will become smarter and more competitive in society.
As long as children are hypnotically captivated in front of the screen, and conservation instinct is completely canceled during watching the screen, TV and computers tend to become the ideal aggressors.
Although corrupts children minds, inhibits the growth, prevents free thought and reflexivity, weakens and destroys creativity and neural networks, tires and stresses to exhaustion, the screen is wanted and loved by children and adults.
Children are not guilty. They do not yet know how to defend themselves, they are not aware of what is happening, they don’t realize the perspective of what constitutes mental disability. It remains for us, their parents and teachers, with love as a measure of our feelings for them, and being aware of the phenomena previously described, to try to guard them against the temptation to escape into virtual reality space.
And we have to do this until it is too late.
THANK YOU!
REFERENCES : 1. Chiriţă, R., Chele, G., Stefãnescu, C., Ilinca, M.,
Chiriţă, V. (2006), Date generale privind efectele utilizãrii calculatorului la copiii şi adolescenţi, Revista Română de Psihiatrie
2. Liiceanu, A. coord. (2007): Viaţa mea: un “joc” serios. Fundaţia pentru pluralism
3. Gheorghe, V., Criveanu, N., Drăgulinescu, A. (2007): Calculatorul, jocurile video şi Internetul. Editura Prodromos
4. Hauge, M.R., Gentile, D.A. (2003) Video game addiction among adolescents. National Institute of Media and the Family