The fun of dying: Physiological responses to violent game events

Niklas Ravaja, Ph.D.

Helsinki School of Economics, Finland email: ravaja@hse.fi

THE CENTER FOR KNOWLEDGE AND INNOVATION RESEARCHH E L S I N K I S C H O O L O F E C O N O M I C S

• Ravaja, N., Turpeinen, M., Saari, T., Puttonen, S., & Keltikangas-Järvinen, L. (2008). The psychophysiology of James Bond: Phasic emotional responses to violent video game events. Emotion, 8, 114-120. (http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=search.displayRecord&uid=2008-01232-011)

• “Gamers Get Their Kicks From Dying,” an article by Clive Thompson in Wired (http://www.wired.com/gaming/gamingreviews/commentary/games/2008/03/gamesfrontiers_0310)

• “The Joy of Sucking,” an article by Clive Thompson in Wired (http://www.wired.com/gaming/gamingreviews/commentary/games/2006/07/71386)

Background

What a death scene looks like on Halo 3.

• We know very little about phasic emotional responses elicited by violent video game events, although they might mediate the potential harmful effects of violent games

• Self-report is an inadequate method to study this issue

• The aim was to examine phasic emotion-related psychophysiological responses to violent events in a first-person shooter (FPS) game.

Background

Hypothesis 1a:

Given that wounding or killing an opponent represents a victory and a success in the game (and in a real gun fight), these events might elicit positively valenced arousal.

Hypothesis 1b:

The deeply ingrained moral code says that injuring or killing another human being is wrong, and symbolic aggression enacted by the player may elicit anxiety. Therefore, an alternative hypothesis would be that wounding or killing an opponent would elicit negatively valenced arousal (i.e., anxiety).

Hypothesis 2:

When compared with low Psychoticism scorers, high Psychoticism individuals would exhibit a more positive, or less negative, emotional response to wounding and killing an opponent.

Hypothesis 3a:

Wounding or killing of the player’s character by the opponent may be a threatening event and represents a failure in the game. Therefore, these events would be expected to elicit negatively valenced emotions (i.e., anxiety, anger, or depressed affect).

Hypothesis 3b

Although at first counterintuitive, it is also possible that these events elicit positively valenced high-arousal emotion (see Ravaja, Saari, Salminen, et al., 2006; Ravaja et al., 2005).

Hypotheses

Participants

• Participants were 36 (25 male and 11 female) Finnish undergraduates, who ranged from 20 to 30 years of age.

Game

• James Bond 007: NightFire (Electronic Arts Inc.) and Super Monkey Ball 2 (Sega Corporation; nonviolent control condition). The games were played with the Nintendo GameCube and presented on a screen (image size: 114 cm [width] 85 cm [height]).

Methods

Physiological measures• Facial electromyography (EMG)

• Provides a direct measure of the electrical activity associated with facial muscle contractions (an important form of emotional expression)

– Zygomaticus major (cheek) muscle area» An index of Positive Affect (PA)

– Orbicularis oculi (periocular) muscle area» An index of PA

– Corrugator supercilii (brow) muscle area» An index of Negative Affect (NA)

• Electrodermal activity (EDA) – The primary psychophysiological index of arousal– As people experience arousal their sympathetic nervous system is

activated, resulting in increased sweat gland activity and skin conductance

Methods

Dimensional Model of Emotion

Psychoticism• Psychoticism as a personality trait was measured with the

Psychoticism scale of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised, Short Form (Eysenck, Eysenck, & Barrett, 1985).

Methods

Game Events• The exact onset times of predefined game events were determined by

examining the played games, frame by frame, using V-ToolsPro 2.20 software.

• We scored four different game events:– The player’s character (James Bond) wounded an opponent character

(NPC; Opponent Wounded)– The player’s character (James Bond) killed an opponent character

(NPC; Opponent Killed)– The player’s character (James Bond) was wounded by an opponent

character (NPC; Bond Wounded)– The player’s character (James Bond) was killed by an opponent

character (NPC; Bond Killed)

Methods

Data Analysis

• Mean values for the psychophysiological measures were derived for one 1-s epoch before each event (Second 1) and for six 1-s epochs after event onset (Seconds 2 to 7). The data were analyzed by the Linear Mixed Models procedure in SPSS with restricted maximum likelihood estimation and a first-order autoregressive covariance structure for the residuals.

• Event-related changes in physiological activity were tested using the following orthogonal contrasts: – Second 1 vs. Seconds 2 to 7 (Contrast 1)– Picking a Banana vs. Opponent Wounded × Second 1 vs. Seconds 2 to 7

(Contrast 2)– Picking a Banana vs. Opponent Killed × Second 1 vs. Seconds 2 to 7

(Contrast 3)– Low Psychoticism vs. High Psychoticism × Second 1 vs. Seconds 2 to 7

(Contrast 4)

Methods

Results I

7654321

Second

0,627

0,6265

0,626

0,6255

0,625

0,6245

SC

L (lo

g[μ

S])

Event: Opponent Killed

7654321

Second

0,662

0,66

0,658

0,656

SC

L (lo

g[μ

S])

Event: Bond Killed

Results II

7654321

Second

2,26

2,24

2,22

2,20

2,18

2,16

2,14

2,12

2,10

2,08

Zyg

om

atic

us

Maj

or EM

G (ln

[μV])

7654321

Second

2,46

2,43

2,40

2,37

2,34

2,31

2,28Zyg

om

aticu

s M

ajo

r E

MG

(ln

[μV

])

Event: Opponent Killed

Event: Bond Killed

Results III

7654321

Second

1,78

1,76

1,74

1,72

1,70

1,68

1,66

Orb

icula

ris O

culi E

MG

(ln

[μV

])

7654321

Second

2,34

2,32

2,30

2,28

2,26

2,24

2,22

2,20

2,18

Orb

icula

ris

Ocu

li E

MG

(ln

[μV

])

Event: Opponent Killed

Event: Bond Killed

• Moderating effect of Psychoticism

Contrast 4 indicated that the decrease in both zygomatic and orbicularis oculi EMG activity elicited by the Opponent Killed event was less pronounced among high Psychoticism scorers compared to low Psychoticism scorers, ps = .005 and .003, respectively.

Results IV

• Instead of joy resulting from victory and success, wounding and killing the opponent may elicit anxiety, anger, or both.

• Personality of the player influences the emotional responses to violence.

• Although the wounding and death of the player’s own character are not likely to elicit solely joy, they appear to increase some aspects of positive emotion.

Conclusions