Are Video Games Connected to Real-Life Tragedies?

All of us -- -- ABC news have devoted this week to hearing from you. Addressing -- question searching for solutions as we. More new town as a nation to cross more than a few of our message boards... See More

All of us -- -- ABC news have devoted this week to hearing from you. Addressing -- question searching for solutions as we. More new town as a nation to cross more than a few of our message boards we've seen more than a few people. Raise concern over violent video games in the cultural effect of having so many young man. Living virtual lives -- first person shooters -- tonight ABC's Neal Karlinsky. Takes a look. Across the country this week America's love affair with violence. Is under the microscope. Two of Hollywood's hottest new releases -- shoot -- -- Jack preacher and jingle unchanged last chance experience very well. -- premieres out of respect. Then came a nighttime TV yet for the video game hit man -- Which led former top Obama advisor David Axelrod to tweet shouldn't we also quit marketing murderer as they gained -- But while the adults were asking about. America's kids went on their daily shooting spree. Virtual violence. -- it's playing one of the most popular profitable. In the most violent games call of duty but so called first person shooter. Because the player -- sonic killer's point of view but is this just good fun. There's an entire generation being trained in desensitized. To the act of shooting people. -- and -- Stephen Lloyd are typical of many in their generation good jobs by date obsessed with call of duty when they get home. Doctor Chris Ferguson is conducted a series of multi year studies of eleven to eighteen year old to find out what violent games -- to them. His conclusion. There is no evidence to suggest that exposure to violent video gains. Is associated with violent criminal behavior. He has -- -- for the outcry over violent games that sometimes follows a mass shooting he calls it. Moral panics whenever a new form -- media comes out particularly older generations don't use and don't understand. Is very very calm and for that new media to be blamed for a variety of social ills. America right. Popular purple -- in the 1950s it was comic books and a full senate hearing over the belief that they were making America's kids turned violent. What we're afraid of we're afraid of her own children. So we forget staff that if it's so for the final Soviet central freedom to -- What we -- our children are -- -- both apple aren't perfect perfect perfect right of people are part of its weapons of murder or robbery the fact of the robbery. By the 1980s it was Tipper Gore vs twisted sister's Dee Snider over the issue of suggestive -- clear. One thing there is so much just they don't Africa's human bondage in some of these news -- His score was looking to -- masochism and -- she found it. But doctor Victor straws burger says cities video games are different more real more intense than anything that's come before. He supports this American academy of pediatrics finding the evidence is now clear and convincing. Media violence is one of the causal factors of real life violence and aggression. Kids spend an incredible amount of time with the media seven to eleven hours a day. They see increasingly violent. Media. We all acknowledge that the media have an impact YY in this country would we spend 250 billion dollars a year on advertising. If we didn't think. Advertising affected people. So whose research to believe who -- judge. The US Supreme Court already has. In striking down California's attempt at a violent video game law the court had this to say about studies linking games to violent behavior. These studies have been rejected by every court to consider them and with good reason. They do not prove that violent video games cause miners to act aggressively. Bunny brought her mother her two young children with their -- concerns also happens to run one of the most successful first person shooter games around. -- -- And while it's far more tame than the violent games many point fingers that -- advice is this -- What do you say to parents who worry it's it's -- -- it's not good for the kids what I recommend says he kids are gonna play games. -- with them in -- so that you can really. Be that answer questions -- and help them do that and then you have to make a decision as a parent. What's right for you. Gains movies music comics. Easy targets amidst. On moral panic as a society if we focus in on the wrong issue we focus in on something that is a red Herring that is not gonna help anybody. -- really distract the national conversation from serious issues I'm Neal Karlinsky for Nightline in Seattle.