R u comfortable being dishonest/antisocial in a game context

It's taken me decades, but I feel I have reached a point where I am comfortable embracing deception in a game setting...

And in addition to this, I am getting used to adopting an antisocial role playing persona in Grand Theft Auto IV, for example, which was difficult for me to do.

As an aspierian, did anyone else have to struggle with the things I mentioned?

games of strategy often involve deception. chess, for example. you don't tell your opponent that you're attacking one area of the board to draw attention away from a move in another area that may give you check-mate. the thing here is that the only thing that might get bruised by you is your opponents ego. and they really shouldn't have engaged in the game in the first place if they weren't prepared for that potential consequence. in short, no, i think i can distinguish the difference between this and applying such techniques to situations outside the context of gaming.

having said that, i really hate disingenuousness as portrayed in dramas or soaps on the TV. and even though i intellectually know they're fiction, emotionally i have to immediately remove myself from that experience, by either changing channel on the TV or even turning off the TV. i've always intellectually felt this was an over-reaction but emotionally the urge to react is so strong as to be irresistible. yet, such situations presented as documentaries don't seem to bother me in this way, which seems somewhat back-to-front to me.

shock_the_monkey wrote:games of strategy often involve deception. chess, for example. you don't tell your opponent that you're attacking one area of the board to draw attention away from a move in another area that may give you check-mate. the thing here is that the only thing that might get bruised by you is your opponents ego. and they really shouldn't have engaged in the game in the first place if they weren't prepared for that potential consequence. in short, no, i think i can distinguish the difference between this and applying such techniques to situations outside the context of gaming.

What about games such as Grand Theft Auto where you have to kill others for personal gain?

Many years ago I started playing Wolfenstein <sp>
At one stage I was forced to kill a guard dog to get through.
This turned me off the game altogether and I stopped playing...

These days, if I have to kill a wolf in Skyrim, I will without hesitation.
I have rationalised it is only a digital representation, so it is OK...

However, the same principle of desensitization applies in real life, most notably in war time situations...

Which brings me to the consideration of what damage to our "humanity" do these games do in real life?

I have often consider the possible parallel between bad/antisocial attitudes of players in a game such as Grand Theft Auto and some of the young people of today in real life...
Are we "breeding"/indoctrinating a whole new class/type of antisocial sociopaths

And also consider this:
Research has determined that the human brain essentially can't differentiate between reality and fantasy in terms of physiological responses...
If you get scared in Half life 2, it is the same way you get scared in real life.
The body responses are essentially identical...

In a more benign experiment, two groups engaged in a sporting activity...
The twist here is, while one group actually practiced physically, the other group simply imagined preforming the activity.

The results seemed to have been conclusive...
Both groups tended to improve their performance at proximately the same rate...

In archery, a teaching technique is to imagine hitting the target where you want before you actually let loose...
This is in keeping with the idea of the strength of mental imagery in performance enhancements...

To me, this suggests how fundamentally primitive the human cognitive process is in terms of differentiating reality from fantasy...

Once again, I bring to mind how curious it is that the human sex response can be stimulated, though groups of various colours, to fool the brain into interpreting these images as worthy of a physical conclusion...

Fascinating, but very odd to the extreme...

In conclusion:
Experimental evidence does strongly suggest that gaming influences the psychological mindset of an individual.
The question is, what are the socio-psychological ramifications of this desensitisation process?

Sh3ld0n wrote:What about games such as Grand Theft Auto where you have to kill others for personal gain?

you've upped the ante a bit here Sh3ld0n. we were talking about deception. no one gets killed playing chess!!!

Sh3ld0n wrote:Many years ago I started playing Wolfenstein <sp>
At one stage I was forced to kill a guard dog to get through.
This turned me off the game altogether and I stopped playing...

These days, if I have to kill a wolf in Skyrim, I will without hesitation.
I have rationalised it is only a digital representation, so it is OK...

However, the same principle of desensitization applies in real life, most notably in war time situations...

Which brings me to the consideration of what damage to our "humanity" do these games do in real life?

I have often consider the possible parallel between bad/antisocial attitudes of players in a game such as Grand Theft Auto and some of the young people of today in real life...
Are we "breeding"/indoctrinating a whole new class/type of antisocial sociopaths

And also consider this:
Research has determined that the human brain essentially can't differentiate between reality and fantasy in terms of physiological responses...
If you get scared in Half life 2, it is the same way you get scared in real life.
The body responses are essentially identical...

In a more benign experiment, two groups engaged in a sporting activity...
The twist here is, while one group actually practiced physically, the other group simply imagined preforming the activity.

The results seemed to have been conclusive...
Both groups tended to improve their performance at proximately the same rate...

In archery, a teaching technique is to imagine hitting the target where you want before you actually let loose...
This is in keeping with the idea of the strength of mental imagery in performance enhancements...

To me, this suggests how fundamentally primitive the human cognitive process is in terms of differentiating reality from fantasy...

Once again, I bring to mind how curious it is that the human sex response can be stimulated, though groups of various colours, to fool the brain into interpreting these images as worthy of a physical conclusion...

Fascinating, but very odd to the extreme...

In conclusion:
Experimental evidence does strongly suggest that gaming influences the psychological mindset of an individual.
The question is, what are the socio-psychological ramifications of this desensitisation process?

i think we all know the answer to this, really. if you desensitise people to violence you naturally end up with a more violent society. one only has to look at the good ol' USA to draw that conclusion. their culture is unremittingly violent, as is portrayed by much of their 'entertainment', and testified to by the regularity with which someone goes 'crazy' and shoots up a school or a cinema. they're even so indoctrinated as to believe that this is enshrined in their constitution, which it isn't. the right to bear arms is as a well organised militia, or makeshift army, not as private individuals.

shock_the_monkey wrote:you've upped the ante a bit here Sh3ld0n. we were talking about deception. no one gets killed playing chess!!!

Not trying to bash you Shocky, but read the subject in the thread carefully.
It covers both dishonesty and antisocial behaviour...

shock_the_monkey wrote:
i think we all know the answer to this, really. if you desensitise people to violence you naturally end up with a more violent society. one only has to look at the good ol' USA to draw that conclusion. their culture is unremittingly violent, as is portrayed by much of their 'entertainment', and testified to by the regularity with which someone goes 'crazy' and shoots up a school or a cinema. they're even so indoctrinated as to believe that this is enshrined in their constitution, which it isn't. the right to bear arms is as a well organised militia, or makeshift army, not as private individuals.

Now consider the additional parameters of age and the intrinsic nature of the individual...

I have been desensitised to killing dogs or wolves in digital form...
I have over come this psychological barrier in games...
But would I do it gratuitiously in real life?
Hardly...
It is not in may nature to harm any living creature through malicious intent alone.

But consider if one had a genetic coding with a predisposition to violence...
The type of natural inclination that might more typically be found in the NT gene pool with it's affinity with establishing social status, often through physical intimidation at it's genesis of social/cultural development...
It may have been a logical evolutionary development through brutal necessity, but this is not the point.

And also consider the influence of early and late attempts of indoctrination through environmental/cultural factors...
Wisdom through age and it's accompanying more developed cognitive reasoning ability would be less effected by primitive impulses.

Since the human male brain is estimated not to be fully developed until the age of 25...
And since this lack of cognitive development would include reasoning and emotional-control factors, it would seem there might be a higher degree of socially unfortunate decision making...

It's late...
Forgive any errors...

Sh3ld0n wrote:Not trying to bash you Shocky, but read the subject in the thread carefully.
It covers both dishonesty and antisocial behaviour...

next time i'll quote the part to which i'm responding. i don't play grand theft auto (of any variety). so, i wouldn't really know what it was about. and anti-social doesn't necessarily mean killing people. i'd say that's an extreme connotation. but, hey, what would i know!!!

shock_the_monkey wrote:next time i'll quote the part to which i'm responding. i don't play grand theft auto (of any variety). so, i wouldn't really know what it was about. and anti-social doesn't necessarily mean killing people. i'd say that's an extreme connotation. but, hey, what would i know!!!

Why would the extreme anti-social act of murder preclude involvement in this discussion?
Oh Shocky, really...
Listen to yourself...

Sh3ld0n wrote:Why would the extreme anti-social act of murder preclude involvement in this discussion?

i didn't say it did. i just didn't srike me that way at the time.

Sh3ld0n wrote:Oh Shocky, really...
Listen to yourself...

... too much GTA4 combined with symptoms of coco-pop over-dose!!!

It's took me awhile to really get to the point where I'm okay "role playing" in a game, doing actions that I may morally find offensive....but it kinda depends.

For example, in most games like GTA - I'm okay enough to role play along, even though in the back of my mind I look at the game as "this is not real, remember that"

There are other examples, that are much harder. For example, I have been playing "Soul Sacrifice" for the Vita lately. The whole notion of sacrificing people *really* bothered me, at the core. When I got to the part where beating a monster gave an option to save or sacrifice a few cats - I couldn't sacrifice them. Mice, on the other hand, I had no problem with....

Dunno. In many cases, I can role play just fine and be okay - but not always.

i love the irony of life
they teach you good values (be honist do good to others etc)
but ppl who honer that the most feel the need to change that
because the world is a hypocrite