ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an account of why violent video games (VVGs) have come to occupy a dominant position in gaming. To an external observer, the events and actions which take place in a video game can appear bewildering. Video games offer enjoyment for people, they motivate them to keep playing, and they may be tapping into something quite profound about human nature and what it means to live a fulfilling life. Games are understood as meeting basic psychological needs. Longitudinal studies measure various factors, including VVG play, over a period of time, extending over several years, examining how people change as a result of the games they play. Such studies are costly to perform, but yield interesting data although correlational in nature. Such studies have the advantage to establish causal links, but are costly and time-consuming, and fraught with technical issues, many of which relate to how the experimental manipulation is delivered, and how the resulting behavior is measured.
