NCJ Number
218155
Journal
Journal of Youth and Adolescence Volume: 36 Issue: 3 Dated: April 2007 Pages: 325-336
Date Published
April 2007
Length
12 pages
Annotation
Based on self-reports, this study examined the roles of age, social intelligence, and parent-child communication in moderating the association between digital game playing and direct and indirect aggression in a sample of 478 Finnish 10- and 13-year-old children.
Abstract
The findings show that playing violent digital games is linked directly with direct aggression, especially at age 10, but only among boys. This link was particularly strong when associated with poor parent-child communication, but only among boys. The moderating effect of social intelligence was substantiated among older boys; game violence was linked with indirect aggression among those with a high level of social intelligence. The findings show the importance of individual and situational factors as moderators of the link between playing violent digital games and aggression. Participants were presented with three similar question patterns in relation to playing television or console games and computer or Internet games. Participants reported how often they generally played the games. Participants indicated how often the games they played contained violence, such as killing, fighting, attacks, and kicking. A revised version of the 10-item Peer-Estimated Social Intelligence scale by Kaukiainen et al. (1998) was used to measure social intelligence (level of social and verbal skills indicative of the maturity of relations, feelings, thoughts, and behaviors). Parent-child communication was measured with the Parent-Adolescent Communication Scale; and aggressiveness, both direct and indirect, was measured with the Direct and Indirect Aggression Scale (Bjorkqvist et al., 1998). 3 tables, 2 figures, and 72 references