Dehumanization and legitimization of armed conflicts in war video games*

Abstract

This article collects predominant representation or representations of war in war video games. To this end, a content analysis is carried out on a sample of 62 video games, which was taken following the sampling criteria of volume of sales or number of downloads in Spain between 2005-2015. This analysis is based on three conceptual lines: a) conflict legitimizers; b) enemy dehumanizers; and c) player de-individualizers. Results show the prevalence of a defense-centered legitimizing discourse of the conflict with no territorial or resource motivations, the absence of civilians during the action of the game, a predominance of enemies with homogeneous appearance and behavior who lack distinctive features and are realistically represented, and some main characters with a default design, heroic background and unreal invulnerability. Relying on the cultivation theory, this descriptive work establishes an empirical basis for further studies on how regular users of this kind of leisure activity construct beliefs and attitudes.