This document discusses a proposal for a paper about video games. It will examine why people play video games using uses and gratification theory and a survey methodology. The paper will include a literature review on how video games are used for stress relief and need satisfaction. It will also discuss how video games do not always take away time and attention, as studies have shown they can promote physical activity. The paper will explore how video games affect different age groups in both positive and negative ways. It will employ a method section and discussion to summarize findings and provide criticism of video games.

1. Delonte Joyce
December 11, 2013
Smith
Writing Assignment #2: Proposal
Introduction
For many years people have been playing different video game consoles. Video games
are a highly popular form of entertainment throughout the world. People of all ages play video
games because of the excitement that they get from playing them. There are many different
genres of video games and they are; action, action-adventure, adventure, role-playing,
simulation, trivia, strategy, educational, etc. There are so many different genres because people
don’t like playing the video games. Everyone’s preferences in video games are not same. Also,
people play video games for other reasons such as happiness, encouragement, and other things
like that. Personally, I play video games because I enjoy the feeling of taking on challenges and
completing things that have to be done within the video game .Throughout this paper I will
talking about different things about video games and I will be doing this using the uses and
gratification theory and with a survey methodology.
In this paper, I will be first doing a literature review. In the literature review I will first be
talking about how people use video games for their own particular purposes. For an example,
someone might not be having a good day because their boss was giving them a hard time at
work, so they would play the video game to relieve some stress. Also, I will be talking about
how people play video games to gratify their certain needs. For an example, someone might
play video games just gratify their need of having a good day. So they would wake up and play

2. the video game so that the rest of their day would go smoothly. Another thing I will be talking
about in this section is how playing video games takes up a lot of people’s attention and time.
When I get caught up in playing video games, sometimes it’s at the wrong time and it takes my
attention off the things that I’m really supposed to be doing. Also, in this section I will be talking
about how video games affect different people differently. People of different ages are affected
by video games in different ways. Finally, the last thing I will be talking about in my literature
review is why people expose themselves to video games. Different people play video games for
different reasons and I’m going to explain the different reasoning’s. Next, in this paper I will be
doing a method section that will basically be telling how I will be conducting my research. Also
in the method section I will be setting up a fake project and telling how I would plan it if I was
doing a real one. Finally, in this paper I will have a discussion section and that will basically be
summing up everything I was talking about throughout the paper. Also in this section I will
provide some criticism that I have about video games. Another thing I will be talking about in
this paper is things that I did not include about video games. I will also be explaining the things I
didn’t include about the two consoles in this section. And finally I will explain what is significant
and what isn’t about this topic and why would anyone care about what I’m talking about in this
paper.
Body
People use video games for their own particular purposes. Some good and some bad
but everyone has a purpose for playing a video game. A study by John L. Sherry, Kristen Lucas,
Bradley S. Greenberg and Ken Lachlan was done to determine the purposes of people playing

3. video games. The first purpose was for arousal, which was meant to stimulate emotions as a
result of fast action and high-quality graphics. A quote from one of the respondents that played
the game for arousal was “I go crazy when I’m playing video games, sometimes. I’m jumping up
and down. Yelling and screaming. Things like that”. The second was for challenging, which was
meant to push themselves to a higher level of skill or personal accomplishment. A quote from a
respondent who played video games for a challenging purpose was “I like it because it’s a
challenge and I like competition. I keep playing until I complete a level or win the game”. The
next was for competition, which was meant to prove to other people who had the best skills
and can react or think the fastest. A quote from a respondent who played video games because
of the competition stated that “We always play in all house (fraternity) tournaments. We used
to put money down”. Next was diversion, which was meant to avoid stress or responsibilities. A
quote from a respondent who played the game for diversion stated that “I like it because it’s a
break from studying and it’s relaxing”. After that was fantasy, which was meant to do things
that they normally would not be able to do such as race cars, fly, etc. a quote from a
respondent who played video games because of fantasies stated that “It’s like you’re in another
world. You’re in a TV, you know. Finally social interaction, which was the main reason why
people got into playing video games and it, was meant to interact with friends and learn about
the personalities of others. A quote from a respondent that played video games because of
social interaction stated that “I play with my boyfriend and friends just to have fun”. (Sherry,
Lucas, Greenberg, Lachlan, 2009).

4. Sometimes people have to play video games in order satisfy certain needs. According to
(Moller, Krahe, 2009) when young boys are going through adolescents, they show an increased
need in novelty, risk-taking behavior, and a heightened level of physiological arousal, which are
in video games. So basically when young boys need to feel aroused they play video games
because it satisfies that need. This information could affect those young boys going through
adolescents because when they feel that need of risk-taking behavior they could play the video
games which will help them not go out and make the wrong decision in real life. For an
example, if a young person feels that they need to go out and steal from a store because of the
need of a risk-taking decision, they can remember that they have a video game back at home
and they can do all the risk-taking decisions they want within that video game without having
consequences. Also, this information could affect those young people going through
adolescents because when they have a heightened level of physiological arousal, they could
play video games which would calm them down. Physiological arousal is when someone feel
the need to defend themselves from physical or emotional attacks and if a young person can
play a video game to calm themselves down from a physical attack, that is a really good thing
because the end result from a physical altercation is usually jail.
Some people say that playing videos games takes up time and that it takes people’s
attention off other things but others don’t see it as a problem at all. A study done by Ralph
Maddison, Cliona Ni Mhurchu, Andrew Jull, Yannan Jiang, Harry Prapavessis, and Anthony
Rodgers in 2007 is basically explaining how video games can help with people’s physical activity.
In the study it stated that U.S. physical activity data suggest that approximately 70% of children

5. ages 9–13 years report participating in free-time physical activity, and only 40% reported
participating in any organized physical activity. For high school students, only 36% had
participated in at least 60 min per day of physical activity. This research is basically stating that
they aren’t getting the physical activity that they are supposed to getting. In the United
Kingdom, where 70% of boys and 61% of girls participated in 60 minutes a day of physical
activity seven days a week. Basically, saying that playing video games helped out with their
health because it acted as a physical activity. A U.S. survey reported that children in Grades 7
and 8 spent an average of 4.2 hours a week playing video games. In the United Kingdom, one
hundred percent of the 3.7 million 6-to-10 year-olds and 97% of the 3.7 million 11-to-15 year-
olds played video games. For 11-to-16-year-old children, 74% played 3–7 times per week
(average session 1.9 hours). The results in the study showed that because of the people playing
video games more often than the U.S. citizens, they were healthier then the U.S. citizens
because they weren’t getting in enough physical activities. (Maddison, Mhurchu, Jull, Jiang,
Prapavessis,Rodgers, 2007). This proves that in this case playing video games didn’t take up
time and attention. In reference to studies put together by Kurt Squire, video games don’t take
up time and can be very helpful in education. According to Squire, educators have begun using
video games, particularly simulations in classrooms. He also says that video games are
becoming more and more widespread in education (Squire, 2003). Even though this
information isn’t everything about whether playing video games takes away attention and that
it takes up time, this is valuable information and people should pay attention to things like this
because it explains some of the good things that is coming from video games.

6. Video games can affect a lot of different people in a lot of different ways. People who
don’t play video games can even be affected by video games. Studies put together by Alice
Mitchell and Carol Savill-Smith in 2004 claims that it has been found that excessive gaming can
produce severe negative psycho-social effects for young people; these range from low self-
esteem and dependency to asocial and aggressive attitudes and behaviors, such as gambling
and stealing to finance play (Mitchell, Savill-Smith, 2004). But they also found that that
aggressive play can also have a relaxing effect on the user and be a way of balancing aggression.
So basically playing video games have both a positive and a negative impact on young people.
After reading that, people would believe the part about excessive gaming for young people
leading to them gambling and stealing because that’s what a lot of people think. They wouldn’t
believe the part that aggressive video game play can also have a relaxing effect on the user and
be a way of balancing aggression because when some people hear about someone playing a
aggressive video game, the first thing they think about is the game having to do with something
such as killing, but that’s not the case with all video games. There are all types of video games
and someone could just love playing educational video games which could help them with a lot
of different things. After learning about the good in video games, this could affect young people
in a good way because when they are stressed out they could just play the video game to
relieve some stress and not doing it in another way like fighting. In another study done by John
L. Sherry, he discovered that children and adolescents playing games in long stretches may
transfer less aggression fromthe game playing situation to the external world than those
playing for brief periods (Sherry, 2001). He says that “Parents’ intuitive reaction to limit playing
time may actually be counterproductive, pulling the child from the game at a time when the

7. largest aggressive effects are likely”. He also says that “The shrinking effect size may reflect
boredom with the game, catharsis, or desensitization to the violence in the game”. He is
basically saying that when young people are playing games for a longer period time, they may
get bored they might not pay attention to the aggressive parts of the game as much as they
would if they were playing the video game for a shorter period of time. When playing for a
shorter period of time they are really into the game and that’s the perfect time for them to
really pay attention to the aggressive play and that’s not what the parents wants to happen.
Finding this research could affect young people in a good way because they won’t be taking in
all of that aggressiveness when playing video games for a longer period of time. But this could
also affect them in a negative way because in some cases playing a video game for a long period
is not a good thing to do because it can distract you. This information could also affect the
parents in a positive way because when they buy these video games for their children they
won’t have to worry about them going out and taking their aggression out on people in the real
world. This could affect the parents in a negative way also because when there children are
playing these video games for long periods of time they might not be taking care of things such
as chores or their homework. Also, in the same study it was found that violent-content video
games will have a positive effect on users, in which violent content media are used as a safe
outlet for aggressive thoughts and feelings (Sherry, 2001). A survey from this research stated
that “adolescent boys reported that they used violent-content video games to discharge
aggression and manage developmental conflicts” (Sherry, 2001). This research is basically
stating that for some users, the violent content in video games is played to clear their heads
from aggressive thoughts and feelings. So whenever they have aggressive thoughts or they just

8. have built in anger, they play video games so that they won’t do something that they will
regret. This could affect those users in a positive way because it won’t allow them to make bad
decisions that could have a major consequence.
Different expose themselves to video games for different reasons. Some people play to
pass time, for companionship, to escape, for the enjoyment, for social interaction, relaxation,
information, or just for the excitement. In research done by Peter Vorderer and Jennings
Bryant, they have discovered that people play video games, each with a different need that gets
met by the type of game they play. There’s the competitor, who plays to be better than others,
which fits under the excitement category because the excitement of being better than
everyone excites them. There’s the explorer, who plays to experience the boundaries of the
world, which fits under the information category because when doesn’t discover something
new it feels like they’ve missed something. There’s the collector, who plays to acquire stuff
throughout the game, which fits under the enjoyment category because they enjoy collecting
new things throughout the video game. There’s the achiever, who plays to be better in rankings
over time, which fits under the social interaction category because when they finally become
the best player in rankings they can talk to other gamers about it. There’s the joker, who plays
for the fun alone and enjoys the social aspects, which fits under the relaxation category
because they enjoy being alone and being able to relax while playing video games. The director,
who plays for the thrill of being in charge, which fits under the companionship category
because they enjoy playing with other people even though they always want to be in charge.
There’s the storyteller, who plays to create or live in an alternate world, which fits under the

9. enjoyment category because they really enjoy being able to build a narrative out of the fantasy
world. There’s the performer, who plays for the show he can put on, which fits under the
excitement category because being able to be the main focus and have everyone paying
attention to what they are doing excites them. And finally there’s the craftsman, who plays to
solve puzzles and build, and this fits under the information category because basically when you
are trying to figure something out, you have to find out information about that particular thing
(Vorderer, Bryant, 2006). This information could affect the way that some people look at video
games. Most people, for an example “adults”, look at video games as ways for people to
commit crimes and do violent acts but after reading this information a lot of people aren’t
playing video games for those reasons. With this research, these people use video games to
gratify there needs of companionship, to escape, enjoyment, social interaction, relaxation, seek
information, or for excitement, which none of these are negative. People who believe that
video games are negative on people’s lives should read research like this because it will show
them that video games is not what they think they are and I believe that games will affect them
in a totally different way.
Method
I am planning on conducting my research by using a survey to determine how people
use video games for their own particular purposes. I will conduct this research using a likert
scale. Using the likert scale, there will be boxes you could check off that best supports your
answer and they will be; strongly agree, agree, neither, strongly disagree, and disagree. I would
ask about 40 questions for people to answer about their purposes of playing video games.

10. Examples of questions I will be asking for my research is; do you play for excitement? Do your
play to pass time? Do you play for enjoyment of video games? Do you for entertainment? Do
you play for the challenge? Do you play because you’re bored all the time? Do you play for
emotional satisfaction? Do you play to gain information about real life skills? Because of stress?
Is it difficult for you to make friends? Questions like these would help me put enough
information together to determine the particular purposes that people have of playing video
games. Of course, only people who have played video games would be able to fill out the
survey so I would make sure that I explain to people that they need to have experienced some
kind of video game. One way I could distribute the survey questions to people is by setting up
at lunch and handing the survey out to people so they could help me gather the information.
Another way I could gather my information is by asking my professors for five minutes of all
their class time so I could tell their students about my survey and ask if they could help me by
filling them out. Finally, the last way I could gather my information is by making a survey on
Survey Monkey and emailing my survey to all the students at my school. I think that this would
be the most helpful way to gather information because sending out a mass email to everyone in
the school will give me a lot of information that I could gather. Having more than enough
information to do research with should be more than helpful. If I had a total of 300 surveys, I
could pick randomly from 150 of them to conduct my research with or if I needed the entire
300, I would just use all of them. Once I finally finished conducting all of my research I would
determine which of the purposes the participants answered the most strongly about.
Discussion

11. Basically everything I discussed throughout this paper is to help me conduct my research and
make it the best research possible. In the beginning of the paper I gave a brief introduction to
what I was going to be talking about in this paper, which was video games. Also, in the
introduction I discussed what the readers was going to be reading when reading my paper. In
the “Body” section of my paper, I did a literature review on different research people had found
about video games. There are also quotes that people had to say about the different topics
about video games that I talked about.
Some criticismthat I have about video games is that we as the gamers shouldn’t have to
pay all this money that they are making us pay for the newest consoles. The two consoles that
I’m referring to are the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4. The Xbox One is $500 and the
PlayStation 4 is $400 and they are also making the gamers pay for extra things such as online-
gaming. We are already paying $500 and $400 for the systems, so know everything else should
come free. I can understand if the price of the game was lower, than I would understand why
Microsoft would make us pay for online. Another thing about the Xbox One is that it can’t stand
up vertical like the Xbox 360 could. I have the Xbox 360 right now and when I lay it horizontally
the consoles gets the red rings, which means that the console is basically broke and you have to
send it back in so that Microsoft can fix it for you. That happened twice to within the four years
that I had the system. So if that happens to me when I get the Xbox One I will be very upset and
I will jump over to the PlayStation 4 because I don’t ever hear of things happening to the PS4.
Criticismthat I have with the PlayStation 4 is that Sony is adding more to the controller and I
feel that everything will be more difficult to do when playing games. I feel that there are

12. already enough buttons to remember when playing a video game on PS4, so for them to add
more buttons to the controller, that will make it more difficult to play. Another thing with the
PlayStation 4 is that Sony is now making PS4 gamers pay to play online also. The PS3, the
system before the PS4, was free to pay online and that was the only reason I wanted to jump
over to PlayStation. I think that PlayStation will lose a lot of their gamers because of this and
will have a major affect when they see that as many people aren’t playing online line they were
on the PS3.
Something I think I could have included when finding research for my paper was
research about the different video game consoles. I feel that adding information about the
different consoles would have made my paper better than it is. For an example, one of the
topics that I found research on in my paper was how video games affect people differently. I
could have found some information about how the pricing of different consoles affected people
when I talked about that topic.
I feel that the topic of my paper is very important and people will care about this after
reading my paper because it will allow people to understand the truth about video games. After
reading the research I found about video games, I think that a lot more parents will allow their
children to play video games because not all video games have negative effects on children. If
the parents choose the games that their children are allowed to play, the children won’t have
negative effects that some video games give to young people.

13. Work Cited
Maddison, Ralph, Cliona Ni Mhurchu, Andrew Jull, Yannan Jiang, Harry Prapavessis, and
Anthony Rodgers. “Energy Expended Playing Video Console Games: An Opportunity to Increase
Children’s Physical Activity?”. Pediatric Exercise Science, 2007, 19, 334-343. Clinical Trials
Research Unit, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
Mitchell, Alice and Carol Savill-Smith. “The use of computer and video games for learning”- A
review of the literature. Learning and Skills Development Agency 2004.
Möller, Ingrid and Barbara Krahé. “Exposure to violent video games and aggression in German
adolescents: a longitudinal analysis”. AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR Volume 35, Issue 1,
January/February 2009, Pages: 75–89, Article first published online : 17 NOV 2008.
Squire, Kurt. “Video Games in Educational Settings”. Video Games in Education. Comparative
Media Studies Department, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA. 02139.
2003.
Sherry. L, John. “THEORETICAL AND METHODOLOGICAL ISSUESIN VIDEO GAME RESEARCH. The
Effects of Violent Video Gameson Aggression - A Meta-Analysis. Article first published online: 10
JAN 2006.
Sherry. L, John, Kristen Lucas, Bradley S. Greenberg, Ken Lachlan. “Chapter 15: Video Game
Uses and Gratifications as Predictors of Use and Game Preference.” VIDEO GAME USES AND
GRATIFICATIONS. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. 2006.
Vorderer, Peter, and Jennings Bryant. "Chapter 7: Why People Play Games: An Industry
Perspective." Playing Video Games: Motives, Responses, and Consequences. Mahwah, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2006.