Violence in E-rated video games

Context Children's exposure to violence, alcohol, tobacco and other substan ces, and sexual messages in the media are a source of public health concern ; however, content in video games commonly played by children has not been quantified. Objectives To quantify and characterize the depiction of violence, alcohol, tobacco and other substances, and sex in video games rated E (for "Everyon e"), analogous to the G rating of films, which suggests suitability for all audiences. Design We created a database of all existing E-rated video games available for rent or sale in the United States by April 1, 2001, to identify the dis tribution of games by genre and to characterize the distribution of content descriptors associated with these games. We played and assessed the conten t of a convenience sample of 55 E-rated video games released for major home video game consoles between 1985 and 2000. Main Outcome Measures Game genre; duration of violence; number of fatalitie s; types of weapons used; whether injuring characters or destroying objects is rewarded or is required to advance in the game; depiction of alcohol, t obacco and other substances; and sexual. content. Results Based on analysis of the 672 current E-rated video games played on home consoles, 77% were in sports, racing, or action genres and 57% did not receive any content descriptors. We found that 35 of the 55 games we playe d (64%) involved intentional violence for an average of 30.7% of game play (range, 1.5%-91.2%), and we noted significant differences in the amount of violence among game genres. Injuring characters was rewarded or required fo r advancement in 33 games (60%). The presence of any content descriptor for violence (n=23 games) was significantly correlated with the presence of in tentional violence in the game (at a 5% significance level based on a 2-sid ed Wilcoxon rank-sum test, t(53)=2.59). Notably, 14 of 32 games (44%) that did not receive a content descriptor for violence contained acts of violenc e. Action and shooting games led to the largest numbers of deaths from viol ent acts, and we found a significant correlation between the proportion of violent game play and the number of deaths per minute of play. We noted pot entially objectionable sexual content in 2 games and the presence of alcoho l in 1 game. Conclusions Content analysis suggests a significant amount of violence in s ome E-rated video games. The content descriptors provide some information t o parents and should be used along with the rating, but the game's genre al so appears to play a role in the amount of violent play. Physicians and par ents should understand that popular E-rated video games may be a source of exposure to violence and other unexpected content for children and that gam es may reward the players for violent actions.