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Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Violent video game proliferation has not coincided with spikes in youth violent crime.

On the front of its Science Times section, the New York Times (2/12, D1, Carey, Subscription Publication, 1.68M) reports, "In surveys about 80 percent of high school-age boys say they play video games, most of which are thought to be violent, and perhaps a third to a half of those players have had a habit of 10 hours a week or more." The Times notes, however, that "the proliferation of violent video games has not coincided with spikes in youth violent crime." In fact, "the number of violent youth offenders fell by more than half between 1994 and 2010, to 224 per 100,000 population, according to government statistics, while video game sales have more than doubled since 1996." The article describes contradictory research into how media violence and video games may affect behavior.

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