Typically, children spend an hour per day playing, with girls devoting an average of 53 min and boys 68 min (KFF 2002). Another nationwide KFF survey (Roberts et al. 1999) found that 8- to 18-year-olds play video games 27 min a day, with boys spending considerably more time gaming than girls (41 min vs. 12 min, respectively). Thus, children may likely be exposed to many sexualized portrayals very early in their socio-emotional development.
If video game content were sexualized in nature, what type of impact would portrayals of sexuality in video games have on youth? The growing body of literature on the influence of television on sexual socialization and stereotyping can give us some idea. Studies have shown that children begin to develop attitudes toward body types between the ages of six and seven years and as children get older these attitudes become stronger (Spitzer et al. 1999). Differences between female body sizes in the media and actual body sizes have been linked to eating disorders (Field et al. 1999), low self-esteem (Polce-Lynch et al. 2001), body dissatisfaction (Harrison and Cantor 1997), feelings of objectification (Frederickson and Roberts 1997), and to the attitude that women’s bodies are projects that need to be worked on (Brumberg 1997, c.f. Murnen et al. 2003). With effects such as these it should come as no surprise that one study noticed an inverse relationship between playing video/computer games and girls’ self-esteem scores (Funk and Buchman 1996).
Females are not the only ones affected by unrealistic body images in the media. Portrayals of muscle-bound men may also set standards for male gamers. Such depictions may contribute to body dissatisfaction among some men, as well as such risky behaviors as steroid use (Labre 2002). Sexualized portrayals of women in the media have been linked to objectification, leading some males to view women and their bodies as possessions (Frederickson and Roberts 1997). Adolescent males’ learning to objectify women from media may lead to negative social, legal, and relational damage.
Because hypersexualized video game characters may encourage or reinforce these negative effects, it is necessary to understand how this may occur. Social cognitive theory (Bandura 2002) provides a theoretical framework to understand how children and adolescents can learn attitudes and beliefs from exposure to video game characters. Bandura (2002) proposed that attention, retention, production, and motivation are processes that govern our ability to learn through observation.
Attentional processes are those that determine which information and observed actions are extracted from a modeled, learning environment. Attractiveness is one variable that affects attentional processing. If a game character is perceived as attractive, observers may be more likely to find them socially acceptable and influential (Bandura 2002). A recent quote from a game reviewer suggests: “There’s no arguing that sex sells. And with the typical gamer a young adult male, you can’t really blame the industry for catering to their target audience” (Morris 2002, n.p.). Overtly sexual, provocatively dressed, or partially naked male or female characters may be very attractive, attention-getting attributes of video game play.
Getting a gamer’s attention is not enough to invoke learning. Without the ability to symbolically code and retain information, Bandura argues (2002, p. 127) observational learning would not be possible. Retention processes involve restructuring modeled events into rules for memory (Bandura 2002). In video games, a player has the ability to witness how characters present themselves and interact with other characters over and over again. Recalling that 8- to 18-year-old males typically play video games for 41 min per day (Kaiser Family Foundation 2002), repeated exposure through extended play should make it very easy for a video game player to create, rehearse, and strengthen symbolic representations of events. Gender schema theory suggests (Calvert and Huston 1987) and subsequent research reveals that exposure to stereotyped, sexual interactions on television can provoke schema that categorize women as sexual, submissive, and less intelligent than their male counterparts (Thompson and Pleck 1986). As such, repeated exposure to attractive, scantly clad female characters may be problematic for young, male gamers’ sexual and relational development.
Production processes “guide the construction and execution of behavior patterns” (Bandura 2002, p.129) which can then be compared to the symbolic representations stored in memory. In using a symbolic representation of a modeled act, a person can adapt it for use in a variety of different situations. Gamers could learn attitudes and beliefs about sex roles and gender stereotyping and apply them to real world situations they find themselves in each day. For example, if a game player notices that males in video games are active, problem-solving heroes and women are incapable and always needing help from men, sex-based stereotypes may manifest themselves in the home, school, or in other social circles.
Motivational processes (Bandura 2002, pp. 129–130) revolve around a person’s ability to create, change, and modify his or her behavior within a social structure. If attitudes are shared by a peer group or reinforced the schemata are likely to be strengthened. Studies generally support this rationale in the violence domain. Children and adults who are exposed to models that are rewarded or not punished for violent actions are more likely to be aggressive immediately after viewing (Bandura 1965; Lando and Donnerstein 1978; Paik and Comstock 1994). Video games certainly contain reward mechanisms. Increases in scores, extra lives, or access to passwords or codes can serve as agents of reinforcement. In the game BMX XXX, players who successfully accomplish the missions are rewarded with codes to view real video clips of exotic dancers performing a strip-tease.
To summarize, video game players, through repeated exposure to attractive, overtly sexualized characters, may begin to develop scripts about gender stereotypes. When sex is used as a reward, players may assume that this type of activity is reinforced and sanctioned by society. Because of this, it is important to examine sexuality in video games.
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Originally Posted by Greyblades
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