Book Opinion: Grand Theft Childhood

I was reluctant in buying that book because some of the content were already known to me and I had access to their published journal articles. So I could’ve saved some money. However, the book contained valuable information that raised eyebrows and some surprising opinions from various experts. The book was well written for a public-oriented audience and had addressed issues parents might have, such as video game violence, addiction, advertisement video games (that was a surprise), etc. I will address some things that I noticed during my reading of this book (as an wanna-be scholar).

As Kutner and Olsen noted, opinions differed based on training, professional background and personal experience (p.63). Throughout the book, they expressed doubts on everything including their own findings. IMO, Besides the persuasive evidence they brought up, another factor I have in mind are the authors’ background, since they’re from a clinical psychological background while other researchers, such as Craig Anderson of Iowa State University are of social psychology background. To elaborate in general, clinical psychologists look for vulnerable groups and what personal and environmental characteristics that may impede these groups’ normal functions within society, in this case whether certain groups are vulnerable to violent video games. This is apparent in their scepticism whether their statistical results apply in real life (see chapter 4). In contrast, social psychologists look for results that apply to individuals of a representative population. So, they may take many factors in consideration and try to see if a variable of interest has an interactional effect with considered factors or an effect beyond such factors. This, I believe, explains why R.L. Huessman’s arguments that violent video games are a public health risk. So, the opinions of experts depend on how they interpret the situation at hand. IMO, Kutner and Olsen seemed to take a pragmatic approach to this problem.