Video games are known to make adolescents engage in aggressive behaviors. Sun & Sun (2021) conducted a research study to identify the direct and indirect relationship between video games and aggressiveness. The research provides further insights into aggressiveness by focusing on the perception of peer norms. The primary behavior under study is aggressiveness, as many teenagers have been exposed to either physical or verbal violence (Sun & Sun, 2021). The study’s main hypothesis is that aggressiveness in adolescents is positively related to video game playing. The independent variable in the study is video game playing, and the dependent variables include aggressive behavior and the prevalence of aggressive behaviors among peers.
The study used the China Education Panel Survey (CEPS) data to find the relationship between the independent and dependent variables. The study involves students in grade 8 and grade 9 as a starting point. A simple random method was employed, and data was randomly selected from 28 countries, focusing on the subunits such as cities, counties, and districts. The data collected incorporated 112 schools and 438 classes (Sun & Sun, 2021).
Before data cleaning, the sample involved 10,750 students from both genders (Sun & Sun, 2021). Students with missing gender were removed from the study leading to a total of 9,561 students remaining. The students who participated in video games were 1,226, making it the final sample total. The proportion of boys in the study was 83.6%, and that of girls was 16.4%. On the family status of the students, 13.6% were rich students, 83.6% were middle class, and 17.3% were poor (Sun & Sun, 2021). The study involved quantitative analysis where measures such as mean and standard deviation of the participants were calculated. The mean and standard deviation was mainly focused on exogenous and endogenous variables. Correlations between the independent and dependent variables were also calculated to give insights into the data.
The study results show a significant positive correlation between the independent and the x dependent variables of the study. The results support the hypothesis of a positive correlation between video games and aggressiveness among adolescents. Girls had a high positive correlation compared to the boys (Sun & Sun, 2021). The results were analyzed using the Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) tool by AMOS version 26. The regression model was used to analyze the data putting into consideration the control variables in the study.
The study results show that when adolescents are exposed to video games, they become more aggressive. Girls are mostly affected because they become more aggressive after playing video games than boys. The study results are positive and can be generalized to other teenage population groups because they used a large sample (Sun & Sun, 2021). The research study should have considered incorporating varying age group sizes to identify when the behavior transcends. However, the relationship between video games and aggressiveness among the girls seems to have been overlooked.
The research is significant in providing further insights into the relationship between video games and aggressiveness among adolescents. However, the data collection method may be insignificant because there are many factors to consider when selecting data, such as the originality of the data. The research study was conducted in 2021, and the data used is from 2014. These may provide a different understanding as population behavior tend to vary with time. Video games vary, and not all video games drive aggressiveness. For example, there are video games that focus on intelligence, such as soccer video games. There are things that I could have changed in the study, which include the population of girls in the research and modifying the hypothesis to only focus on violent video games.
References
Sun, Y., & Sun, M. (2021). How peer influence mediates the effects of video games playing on adolescents’ aggressive behavior. Children and Youth Services Review, 130, 106225. Web.