The big problem I have with this kind of thing is the Grade 9 to Grade 12 age group. Violent video games are generally not meant for children, so why study their affects on children?
I understand that you want parents to be informed about their choices for their children, but unfortunately, this kind of study has a history of being (ab)used by groups trying to limit adult's access to this kind of video game, which I have a serious problem with.
> Violent video games are generally not meant for children, so why study their affects on children?
First, a few points:
* Many things are "not meant" for teenagers, yet teens acquire (or do) them anyways. Examples include: alcohol, tobacco, watching R-rated movies, etc.
* You may have forgotten just how old kids in highschool are. Specifically, these are teenagers from 14-15 (Grade 9) to 17-18 (Grade 12). While no one under 18 should be playing M-rated games, these individuals are hardly babies.
To answer your bigger question: studies like this are important because teens are a huge video game demographic and are still developing (mentally and physically) during their highschool years. Only now are we seeing such an abundance (and easy access to) video games of all kinds, including violent video games. We must have more such long-term studies in order to understand any potential risks for Jimmy if he spends 3+ hours every day playing a game in which his character "kills" humans (who are mostly foreigners and often in gruesome ways).
You are welcome to mention parental responsibility and voluntary rating guidelines (and these are good points). I'm also against the terrible, blanket attempts at regulating violent video games we've seen in California and other states. However if we discover a link between violent video games and long-term increases in teen aggression then I see nothing wrong with strengthening legislation concerning the sale of M-rated games to minors.
Interestingly, you seem to imply that increase of aggression level is bad (conclusion of this study is that aggression is higher in teens that play violent games), while high level of aggression is most likely bad, it may very well to turn out that on average relative increase of aggression level in individual may have positive effects for said individual.
Just to give a little context for my comments, I'm from Australia and we've just this year finally introduced an R rating for video games (after 10 years of lobbying - previously, MA15+ was the highest available). To be honest, I'd love to be debating the issues in California because that's positively progressive to the kind of debate we've had here in regards to video games :)
This is exactly the kind of emotionally-charged comment that is not conducive to a rational discussion.
Let's not "throw science under the bus" at all. In fact, there have been studies[1] which show violent crime decreases as access to violent video games increase.
Not all studies are created equal. The study in the article you link to shows that violence decreases in the short term when a violent block buster is released, because violent individuals are busy playing. The article also criticizes lab studies that show an immediate effect as synthetic, not reflecting reality.
The study linked above looks at mid/long term effects on a large-ish cohort in a real world setting.
Studies[1] have also shown that competitiveness of the game is a better predictor of aggression, rather than violence. This study does nothing to control for that, as far as I can see. Its certainly a fact that most violent games are also quite competitive.
> The study in the article you link to shows that violence decreases in the short term when a violent block buster is released, because violent individuals are busy playing.
That's right, but I fail to see how that's a flaw in the study?
I understand that you want parents to be informed about their choices for their children, but unfortunately, this kind of study has a history of being (ab)used by groups trying to limit adult's access to this kind of video game, which I have a serious problem with.