For Science: Yet another study finds no link between violent video games and aggression

February 15, 2019 1:00 PM

See, this is why no one likes you. It's because of this.

Yet another academic study appears to indicate no correlation between aggressive behavior and violent video games, this one specifically in kids.

In the newly published Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents’ aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report, authors Andrew K. Przybylski and Netta Weinstein interviewed over a thousand young British teenagers and their guardians to measure both their gaming activities and their patterns of aggressive behavior.

“Following a preregistered analysis plan, multiple regression analyses tested the hypothesis that recent violent game play is linearly and positively related to carer assessments of aggressive behaviour. Results did not support this prediction, nor did they support the idea that the relationship between these factors follows a nonlinear parabolic function. There was no evidence for a critical tipping point relating violent game engagement to aggressive behaviour. Sensitivity and exploratory analyses indicated these null effects extended across multiple operationalizations of violent game engagement and when the focus was on another behavioural outcome, namely, prosocial behaviour.”

Przybylski has cropped up in our pages before for his work on screentime and addiction.

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