Abstract

MORAL-PEREZ, M. Esther del  and  RODRIGUEZ-GONZALEZ, Christian. Opportunities for War Video Games to Activate Critical Thinking: Players Opinions. Rev. colomb. educ. [online]. 2022, n.85, pp.242-242.  Epub Nov 28, 2022. ISSN 0120-3916.  https://doi.org/10.17227/rce.num85-12561.

This research analyzes the potential of war videogames to activate critical thinking of [he players, like cognitive process that allows them to explain war, recognize its nature and evaluate its consequences from an ethical perspective. The study analyzes the opinion of a sample of military video game users (N=2I3) about different aspects inherent to the dimensions that define it: cognitive, personal-attitudinal, ethical, argumentative logic and expressive-communicative. The methodology adopted is mixed: a) qualitative, focused on the design of the Critical Thinking WCV questionnaire (73 items), validated by Delphi method; and, b) quantitative, focused on the analysis of their opinions about the opportunities that these video games offer them to stimulate their critical thinking, taking into account the established dimensions. The results show that these games allow them to know the nature of warlike conflicts -especially historical-, their causes and consequences by showing them crudely. In addition, they invite you to reflect on the interests of the war and collateral damage. Audiovisual resources favor their immersion in the story, although they limit their freedom to make decisions in the game. Women are more critical of the representation and justification of war, they point out that these video games trivialize it by considering the violence necessary to defend themselves. They also denounce that they do not foster empathy with the victims and reinforce racial and gender stereotypes. In conclusion, these games enhance the cognitive, argumentative, and expressive-communicative dimensions inherent in critical thinking towards war, but not the personal-attitudinal and ethical.

Keywords : critical thinking; Delphi technique; video games; war; mixed methods research.

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