'No link' between playing violent games as a child and fighting as an adult

Violent video games are often blamed for people behaving aggressively in real life, but a new study claims that there is no clear link between the two. They found that, while people who played video games as a child were more likely to get into fights as an adult, gaming could not be pinpointed as the cause. Other factors such as gender and environment may have just as important role to play in people becoming violent as adults, the researchers claim. 'While the data show that fighting later in life is related to playing video games as an adolescent, most of this is because, relative to females, males both play games more often and fight more often,' said Dr Michael Ward from the University of Texas Arlington, who authored the study. 'Estimates that better establish causality find no effect, or a small negative effect.'