Impact of online mobile violent video game playing among school going early adolescent children: An analysis of aggressive behaviour, psychosocial well-being, sleep and academic outcomes

For first and middle school children, the effects of violent content in online mobile games have not been studied enough, though there is high engagement with the genre. We investigated the effects of violent online mobile games on school children’s aggression levels, psychosocial difficulties, sleep issues, and academic performance. We conducted a cross-sectional analysis on 250 students between the ages of 10 and 14. Due to the absence of a field survey, we created a synthetic participant-level dataset for the analysis. This data must not be presented as survey data collected from children. We used Pearson correlations, one-way ANOVA, multiple linear regressions, descriptive statistics, and chi-square tests on gaming duration, violent content, bedtime gaming, and outcomes measured in the study. Participants gamed for a mean of 1.54 hours per gaming day (SD = 0.88). Violent games were correlated with aggression (r = .59, p < .001), sleep disturbance (r = .63, p < .001), and psychosocial difficulty (r = .45, p < .001). Gaming duration was negatively correlated with academic performance (r = −.48, p < .001). For aggression, there were differences across the three exposure groups, F(2, 247) = 51.50, p < .001, η² = .29. For the adjusted regression analysis, exposure was the most predictive of aggression (standardized β = .54, p < .001; adjusted R² = .35). Our findings should be cautiously interpreted. We encourage balanced gaming routines, bedtime limits, and engagement from parents.