The study, covered in an article by the Washington Post, was written by psychologist Craig Anderson of Iowa State University. Anderson is the director of the school's Center for the Study of Violence, and since 1995 he's written more than 20 papers and even a book on videogame violence and its effect on gamers. Each and every time, Anderson states much the same conclusion: violent games increase violent behavior.
In his most recent work, Anderson and his team analyzed existing studies of 130,000 people in the U.S., Europe, and Japan. In conclusion, Anderson proposes that it's time to stop questioning whether videogames increase violent behavior and time to start addressing the problem:
Concerning public policy, we believe that debates can and should finally move beyond the simple question of whether violent video game play is a causal risk factor for aggressive behavior. Instead, we believe the public policy debate should move to questions concerning how best to deal with this risk factor. Public education about this risk factor -- and about how parents, schools, and society at large can deal with it -- could be very useful.
Avid videogame players stand in line for Wiis.
However, others believe Anderson's work has proven nothing. Texas A&M department of behavioral applied science professors Christopher Ferguson and John Kilburn rebutted Anderson's conclusion:
Although it is certainly true that few researchers suggest that VVGs are the sole cause of violence, this does not mean they cannot be wrong about VVGs having any meaningful effect at all. Psychology, too often, has lost its ability to put the weak (if any) effects found for VVGs on aggression into a proper perspective. In doing so, it does more to misinform than inform public debates on this issue.
Sharkey says: The biggest hurdle Anderson and his team have failed to overcome in their 15-plus years of studying violent videogames is a link to real-world violent actions. More people are playing VVGs than ever before and crime rates have steadily declined nationwide over the past 10 years. If Anderson's hypothesis were true, or even remotely accurate, wouldn't there be a correlation to the overall crime rate?
