SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
More than 200 academics have signed an open letter criticizing a controversial new statement [PDF] by the American Psychological Association suggesting a link between violent video games and increased aggression.
The APA writes:
It is the accumulation of risk factors that tends to lead to aggressive or violent behaviour. The research reviewed here demonstrates that violent video game use is one such risk factor.
A positive association between violent video game use and increased aggressive behavior was found in most (12 of 14 studies) but not all studies published after the earlier meta‐analyses. This continues to be a reliable finding and shows good multi‐method consistency across various representations of both violent video game exposure and aggressive behavior.
However, the group of academics said they felt the methodology of the research was deeply flawed as a significant part of material included in the study had not been subjected to peer review. "I fully acknowledge that exposure to repeated violence may have short-term effects - you would be a fool to deny that - but the long-term consequences of crime and actual violent behaviour, there is just no evidence linking violent video games with that," said one.
"If you play three hours of Call of Duty you might feel a little bit pumped, but you are not going to go out and mug someone."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 19 2015, @12:35AM
psychology is not a social science. that entire link is one long stawman, intentionally defining psychology as something its not.
Sorry, but no. You can't look at garbage like what this article is about and pretend there isn't a problem by saying, "Well, technically, psychology covers more than just social sciences..." That's missing the point spectacularly.
psychology includes some social science stuff
Which is what is under discussion. Even brain scans are repeatedly abused to reach arbitrary and subjective conclusions about behavior. The social sciences are just the worst part of it.
while the majority is just as "hard" a science as physics and biology.
Well, thanks for the laugh.
(Score: 2) by tathra on Wednesday August 19 2015, @04:30AM
there's no "technically" about it, that entire rant you linked is nothing but a strawman because it defines psychology as something its not. since its fallicious from the start, the entire thing is invalid.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 20 2015, @11:16AM
there's no "technically" about it, that entire rant you linked is nothing but a strawman because it defines psychology as something its not.
A straw man of who or what? Who specifically is that article straw manning? Or do you just mean to say it is incorrect for defining psychology in that way?
Also, that is "technically". You decide to focus on the inconsequential while missing the larger point. I don't know why.
since its fallicious from the start, the entire thing is invalid.
No, you haven't disproved the conclusion merely by finding what you perceive as a few fallacies.
1 + 1 = 3
2 + 2 = 5
3 + 3 = 6
Despite the fact that the first two are wrong, the third one is still correct. Trying to say that everything about the article is incorrect merely because you believe you've spotted some fallacies is just silly.
(Score: 2) by tathra on Thursday August 20 2015, @09:21PM
the rant in the article you linked is entirely based upon defining psychology as a "social science", which it is not. since it is based on a false premise, the conclusion cannot be trusted to be valid.