Leave alone aggression, video games can make teens more rebellious and sensation seeking individuals. New findings published online in APA's journal Psychology of Popular Media Culture found mature-rated, risk-glorifying video games turning teens into irresponsible drivers, encouraging drinking during driving and thus increasing accidents and police stops.
"Most parents would probably be disturbed to learn that we observed that this type of game play was more strongly associated with teen drivers being pulled over by the police than their parenting practices," said study lead author Dr. Jay G. Hull, of Dartmouth College, in a statement. "With motor vehicle accidents the No. 1 cause of adolescent deaths, popular games that increase reckless driving may constitute even more of a public health issue than the widely touted association of video games and aggression."
For examining the link, the researchers included more than 5,000 U.S. teenagers. All the participants of the study provided details through telephone for four years (at 14, 15, 16 and 18 years).
Half of the participants, during the first interview (at age 14) reported playing mature-rated games like Spiderman II (32 percent), Manhunt (12 percent) and Grand Theft Auto III (58 percent).
The researchers found all these games making the young drivers to seek sensation, rebellious and self-reported risky driving.
The risky driving behavior was found going up during the two next follow ups, with the number of car accidents going up from eight percent to 14 percent, police interference from 11 to 21 percent.
During the third interview (at age 16), though 25 percent of teens agreed engaging in unsafe driving habits, in the final follow-up (at age 18) about 90 percent, agreed having rash driving habits like over speed (78 percent), tailgating (26 percent), failure to yield (23 percent), weaving in and out of traffic (25 percent), violating traffic rules like running red lights (20 percent), ignoring stop signs (19 percent), crossing double line (13 percent), speeding through yellow lights (71 percent) and not using a seatbelt (27 percent).
Hull and colleagues also measured the sensation seeking and rebelliousness behavior of the participants by taking their opinion on such questions as "I like to do dangerous things," and "I get in trouble at school."
Apart from these, other factors like gender, age, race, parent income and education and parenting styles were also taken into consideration.
"Playing these kinds of video games could also result in these adolescents developing personalities that reflect the risk-taking, rebellious characters they enact in the games and that could have broader consequences that apply to other risky behaviors such as drinking and smoking," Hull said.
