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. 2023 Dec;18(6):365-381.
doi: 10.1080/17470919.2023.2284999. Epub 2023 Dec 6.

Desensitized gamers? Violent video game exposure and empathy for pain in adolescents - an ERP study

Ewa Miedzobrodzka  1   2 , Johanna C van Hooff  3 , Lydia Krabbendam  2 , Elly A Konijn  1
Affiliations

Desensitized gamers? Violent video game exposure and empathy for pain in adolescents - an ERP study

Ewa Miedzobrodzka et al. Soc Neurosci. 2023 Dec.

Abstract

This Event-Related Potential (ERP) study aimed to test how habitual and short-term violent video game exposure (VVGE) may affect empathy for pain responses in adolescents. In a within-subjects design, boys (N = 56; aged 12-16 years) performed a pain judgment task before and immediately after playing a violent video game. In this task, participants judged whether photos of hands depicted on their screen were in a painful situation or not. While both the P3 and the LPP components were not related to habitual violent video game exposure, general exposure to antisocial media content predicted lower P3 amplitudes to painful pictures. Further, 40 min of violent gameplay did not affect the P3 responses; however, it temporarily decreased LPP responses to painful pictures, suggesting a modest short-term desensitization effect. However, this latter interpretation is limited by a strong LPP pain effect - a significant amplitude difference between painful and non-painful pictures - that remained present in the post-game condition. Such persistent LPP effect may relate to the notion that adolescents are still learning how to properly regulate their emotional reactions. This study contributes to the limited literature on violent video games' desensitization in adolescents' brains, opening new avenues for media violence research.

Keywords: ERP; Violent video games; adolescents; desensitization; empathy for pain.

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Conflict of interest statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Example of stimuli used in the task (Meng et al., Meng et al., 2023) (A and B); example of an EEG trial in the pain judgment task (C).
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Grand average ERP waveforms averaged across 6 electrodes with marked time windows for the P3 and the LPP components: (A) pre-game condition, (B) post-game condition.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
P3 amplitude as a function of Time (pre-game vs. post-game) and pain (painful vs. non-painful pictures).
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
LPP amplitude as a function of Time (pre-game vs. post-game) and pain (painful vs. non-painful pictures).
Figure 5.
Figure 5.
Visualization of the Time x pain x C-ME interaction for P3.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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