Gaming Console Platform

Some studies have shown that video games breed violence, while others say that it’s actually healthy for kids. It’s a bit messy, really.

Let’s put violence on the shelves for now and take a look at this new study from Herber Gintis, Economics Professor at the Central European University. The research studies behavioral patterns by using games. Introversion, in particular, was given attention.

The study collected data from 15 countries with varying levels of economic development, having its subjects play cooperative games.

The study used the cooperative games as a tool to show how economic and social institutions influences a person’s willingness to cooperate with others. The study showed that:

university students in democratic societies with advanced market economies rarely exercised a type of antisocial punishment featured in the game, while this behavior was commonly exercised by students in traditional societies based on authoritarian and parochial social institutions.

The study has no solid conclusions as of yet, but the findings are interesting nonetheless. Here, games were used as a tool to show how the economy influences introversion. It would be interesting to see if they could also show if video games themselves influence human behavior as well.