--Original published at Marlee's Psych 105 Blog

I agree with B.F. Skinner’s claim that free will is spurious. I think that we as humans created the idea of free will because we feel like we need to be in control at all times. To some extent the idea of free will is true; we can make our own decisions and act out of desire, but a majority of our behavior is influenced by the three levels of analysis. These include, biological, psychological and socio-cultural influences.

In the video provided skinner gives the example of gambling and how it is a cause of scheduled reinforcement. On that note if something like gambling is due to scheduled reinforcement, who’s to say that other aspects of our lives aren’t? When someone performs a preferable behavior their is generally a reward; whether it is self rewarding from our brains in the form of serotonin and dopamine or in the form of rewards from society such as friendship and promotion. This human desire for constant reward has created a society which we are constantly undergoing scheduled reinforcement without us even realizing it. It is not until we take a step back, when we realize how conditioned to favorable behavior we really are.

Skinner replicates this human behavior by using pigeons and scheduled reinforcement. The pigeons are taught that by pecking at certain words or color disks that they will eventually be rewarded with food. This reward can be presented after a certain amount of pecks or even after a certain period of time. This experiment replicates the human behavior of gambling very well. People use slot machines and other forms of gambling repeatedly (pecking)  until they win (food reward).  When gambling we think that we are in complete control f how much money we’re betting, but in reality are we just being exposed to scheduled reinforcement?

--Original published at AlyssaM

I will openly say this will be biased. I believe violent video games do make people more violent in everyday life. The more people or children play the violent games, the worse they will become without even knowing it. Gradually over time there actions will become worse and more harsh with no thought put into what they are doing. My younger brother when he was little used to be really great and kind, which left us getting along well. Then video games took over his life, not violent ones though. He started spending more and more time on the TV playing the games and started slacking in his schoolwork and other activities. As he got older, he shifted in the games he played to more violent ones (though I can’t recall exactly which ones). Continuously he played the games for hours on end instead of doing homework. I noticed as time went on that if he lost or something went wrong in the game, he would scream and shout at the screen. Sometimes he went as far as throwing the remote across the room.His behavior became more violent too and he is only 15 now. One time, he and my mom were arguing over who knows what and he kicked a hole in the wall. As result of observing his actions, I blame the video games and yes I believe all violent games should be destroyed. A time restriction on how long a day people can play any video games should be set, so they can go outside and enjoy life. The video games that make the player get off the couch and be active to win such as Wii Sports, are good and encourage the right things unlike the violent ones. That is why I believe they are bad and should be banished from the universe.

--Original published at Manami PSY105blog

There has been a controversial issue of violence in a video game makes a child violent for over 20 years. Does actually violence effect on children’s behavior?

First, the most common reason why people play a video game may be releasing stress and just having a fun in their leisure time. Also, I read an article before, it says that playing a game is the only way to attack and kill people legally for some people who have stress about relations in daily life. Nowadays, the visual quality of the game is better to get popularity more. In other words, it is getting real and gross visually as video game industry’s strategy to make money.

I have ideas to both agree and disagree with the calls that video games have to be prohibited permanently.

For supporting the calls, it is understandable what the graphics and guns game is increasing is becoming a big issue with criticism of video game industry. Because first-person shooter and graphical development of violent games help children to imagine a real situation in which children actually kill someone or people actually are killed by their hand. They gradually get to use to seeing it. Some children may have an interest in what is going to happen in real life. Also, they may think that they can get the same excitement and release stress like the game in real situations too. In my opinion, that is the common case and steps to make a child criminal.

However, it is said that a violent video game is not a direct cause that children become more violent. The environment in which children can reach guns daily must be the biggest issue. In fact, the age limitation of playing violent games in the USA is higher than the one in Japan. These two countries differences whether having guns are legally and socially accepted or not. The US government can make safe environment prevent that sad incident are happened by children without any damages on the video game industry. Besides this, it is difficult to be clear the correlations between violent video games and children’s violent behavior because children who behave violently tend to have a mental issue from their experiences or difficulties to learn social moral. Children gradually learn moral and abilities which they can recognize the differences between good and bad behaviors especially based on social acceptance like law when they are growing up. If they have the appropriate education and grow up normally, they would not be criminals.

I think ideas of disagreement is stronger for now.

#learning

--Original published at RachelsCollegeBlog

Violence in video games has become more vivid and graphic. I, however, do not believe that the increase in violence in video games is the sole reason for the increase of violence in reality. Throughout history, violence has always been a part of society in some way or another. Though, one of the most prominent examples can be war, when it comes to things in society, you could also put a blame on movies or even adult figures in a child’s life. Movies have always included some kind of violence, whether it was the three stooges poking each other in the eyes or watching Wild West movies with cowboys and bandits shooting at each other. The years have gone on, violence is still incorporated into movies in a more vivid manner, just as they are in video games. This being said how was it the increase in violence only blames on the video games when they are other methods of which violence can be expressed to a child? Violent video games can be seen by many different perspectives, though most negative, there is at least one positive that I can think of, children are able to see what some people go through in a war zone, in the military, and hopefully that game will increase the amount of support that is given to those in service.

Family members can also speak in a violent manner, making a child believe that violence is not a bad thing, but rather a good thing. If parents are expressing violence, why can’t the child? Therefore, I do not believe that you can explicitly blame video games for the increase in violence as there are many different aspects that can produce the increase in violence in todays society. I do not believe that the banning of video games is going to help to issue of violence in todays society so I disagree with them being permanently banned.

--Original published at Rachel Bickelman's PSY 105 Blog

I agree with B.F. Skinner’s belief in that free will is fictitious. The idea of free will is partially true, for we can act out of our own desires but a majority of our behavior is influence by the three levels of analysis: biological, psychological, and socio-cultural influences.

Like Skinner said, people gamble because of the scheduled reinforcement, but whose to say that life is simply a series of scheduled reinforcement? When an individual behaves in a certain, preferable manner, there is a distinct reward whether is is in the brain or in society. This reward is evident in the brain, like Skinner explained, through chemicals like dopamine. Whereas in society, behaviors are rewarded through friendships, a promotion, or recognition by authority. If we think about behaviors as pathways to rewards, then there is not such thing as free will because all of us are just behaving to find fulfillment in what is socially, biologically, or psychologically rewarding.

The part of Skinner’s argument I found most compelling was discovering the causes of behavior. By discovering these causes, we enable the ability to control the outcomes and even the sheer cause of behavior. When behaviors are subject to manipulation due to knowing their cause, internal will decreases. Thus, with each socially rewarding behavior, internal free will decreases because humans are not doing something because they innately or intrinsically want to, but because they are unconsciously groomed to receive the reward of said behavior. Internal will then decreases because one is not acting out of truth but unconsciously for reward.

In sum, I think B.F. Skinner makes a compelling argument in the existence of free will and the scheduled reward of behavior.

--Original published at Sydney’s Side

Blaming video games for a increase in violence, is just another way for parents to blame society for what is wrong with their children. Twenty years ago, there limited media to show what was going on in the world. Violence is not increasing, it is just portrayed more and more on TV and the internet. News sources want people to look at what they are reporting so they try and get the shock factor. People are not going to read an article or watch a news report about a normal day in their town. Viewers will watch what grabs their attention.

It is true that video games have become more graphic and more guns but there are also regulated age restrictions on these games. By the time you are 18 and are allowed to play to most violent of games, your character is pretty much set in stone. If there are instances of young children playing the mature games, that is not society’s fault. The real reason games have more gore and seem real is because of the increase in technology. The same thing is happening in horror movies today and no one is blaming violence on that. But along with the rise in violent games, there has also been rises in things such as mental health awareness, gun safety, and public health in general. There is nothing wrong with the games, the times are changing and the people claiming that it is ‘hurting the children’ are from previous generations.

The calls to permanently ban video games are preposterous, there is no way that the people making money off of these games will just destroy their products. Additionally, it is a harsh way to solve a problem that doesn’t exist. If those against violent games wanted to focus on the source, they would need to take a look at the number of violent acts on a larger scale. For example, compare our acts of violence to other countries and determine if violence and school shootings are actually increasing or if we’re just seeing more of it.

--Original published at Cecilia's Thoughts

B.F Skinner researched operant conditioning which is the idea that if you train an animal or person that when they complete one action they get reward. In the experiment shown in the video it had pigeons that were trained to peck when they saw a color and when they pecked, they received food. They also had pigeons see the word turn and peck and the pigeon was able to recognize the correct one to do through operant conditioning. The pigeons knew when they saw turn, they turned and in return got food and when they saw peck, they pecked and recieved food. B.F Skinner claimed that this directly relates to humans, an example is gambling. He believes that people gamble because of the scheduled reward while they do it, which is an example of operant conditioning. The interviewer then ask Skinner about free will, and he says that there is no such thing, he quotes Jonathan Edwards who said, “We believe in free will because we know about our behavior but not its causes.” Meaning that without knowing the causes of our actions and being able to control those causes then we truly to do not have freewill.

I agree with Skinner’s idea that there is no free will because in a situation you know what is right and wrong and if you were to ask someone why the right reaction is the right reaction and vice versa, most likely their answer would be “because” which you would then ask, “because why?” and if someone asked me that question I would say, “because that is how it has always been, that is how it is supposed to be” and I believe this is a form of operant conditioning because it is the idea that we carried out these actions and learned the consequences of actions and we continued with the “right” one, the decision that got us the food, per say. We have been taught in society, that you respect your elders, follow directions and behave. So when your mom or dad yells at you, you know to say yes ma’am or yes sir and keep going, but why? Why do we do this? And the only reason I can come up with is because that is what we always do and when, as a child you do this, in most cases your parents reward you by lifting the punishment or making it less severe, which is operant conditioning. Representing, at least in my opinion that we do not have true free will.

--Original published at Jayln's Perspective

Over the years, as technology has advanced, arcade-style video games have evolved into a highly violent style of gaming. Violent video games are a substantial facet of today’s culture because they have become apart of many adolescent’s schedules. For example, most teenagers, especially boys, come home from school and play hours of violent video games. It’s a source of stress relief after a long day of school, and for them, it seems to be a form of mindless entertainment. Although I do not necessarily think that violent video games should be banned, I feel as if this type of gaming should be restricted from young children until they can comprehend that there is a difference between gaming and real life. Until children are able to identify the value of human lives and that actions have consequences, they should not be allowed to sit in front of a screen and play countless hours of graphics games.

I believe that barbaric video games are desensitizing today’s youth. If a child is exposed to violence at a young age, even something as standard as a video game, it will negatively affect their view of the world. If children are constantly exposed to killing, then they will not recognize the horror of violence. Raising children on these types of games is counterproductive to society because it is producing a generation that is unphased by the violence that is occurring in other parts of the world. To young children who are unable to distinguish the difference between a video game and the real world, violence is just a part of everyday life. Although playing violent games does not necessarily mean a child will end up aggressive and desensitized, it still may give him or her an idea of what they can do to a classmate, parent, or teacher if they have an issue with them. I do not believe that violent video games should be banned because I think it comes down to the parent’s judgment on what their child is able to handle and at what specific age. When parents are contemplating whether or not they should buy their child a more graphic video game, they should consider their maturity level and if it will have a negative impact on their psychological development.