Computer games are supported by some families because of their advantages, while other parents are against them. Discuss both views and give your opinion.
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
Healthy video games, like healthy diets, are good for children. There is continuing concern that playing violent video games may increase the risk of aggression in players, while less is discussed about the possibility that this activity, if properly monitored by parents, may promote certain positive developments. It may be advisable to reframe the debate in reference to potential costs and advantages.
Obviously, some families are over-worried about the bad effects on kids and teens who have the habit of playing video games, particularly those with violent (or adult) content. To start with, it may be true that children learn their attitudes about violence at a very young age and unfortunately these attitudes tend to last. It is possible that often boys rather than girls are taught to use fighting instead of self-control to handle problems or conflicts. Needless to say, most parents are increasingly aware of their children's poor school performance probably being linked to an addiction to heavily playing video games whose nature is unknown. What is more, it goes without saying that spending too much time in front of the screen is harmful to children both physically and mentally. Further, according to a number of unconfirmed research reports on behavior, some of these undesirable consequences might cause signs of fatigue during the day and nightmares during the night.
To no small an extent, many families actually support video games for having positive effects, including one known as visual-spatial cognition. For one thing, the dispute on video game violence has arguably been narrow in that it assumes that all video games would encourage violence. Contrary to this argument, playing video games may, among other things, help children to practice visual-spatial cognition, a skill needed to solve a math problem or complete a jigsaw puzzle. It should be noted that since few studies examine non-violent games specifically, it is easy to overlook the overall impact of these games. Apart from being entertaining and stress-relieving, many such games prove valuable as learning tools, at minimum related to visual-spatial abilities. Accordingly, to be on the safe side, it behooves parents and children alike to have a wise choice in whether to accept such positive values.
It can be seen that, more often than not, research findings about the effects of playing video games are biased, being focused only on the negative side, or making a claim by seeing some trees without having a wider perspective of the forest . For parents, therefore, the thing to do is to distinguish between good and bad video games, and to limit the screen time for the best interests of the younger generation. After all, video games are not unlike foods of different values; some are tasty and good for health while others, although tasty as well, are not suitable for immature minds.