Oxford says violent games don't lead to aggressive behavior

If you out a bunch of apes to press the buttons on a keyboard, you will apparently get a Silmarillion, in few centuries, though there will be one. So, we are in any measures not  comparing British scientists to apes, but they can make a research on anything, useful or not. In time. Still, we do know that videogames do not make us angrier in real life, are they? 

Oxford's best researchers have published a recent study with the conclusion that people's aggressive behaviour is not a consequence of violent video game engagement.  

The UK scientists had 1,004 adolescent participants and their caretakers in the study. Researchers had interviewed them about their recent gaming experiences from different perspectives. And the hypothesis was made: the amount of time played in violent video games is positively correlated with more aggressive behaviour and even less prosocial behavior — but that wasn't the case.  

"The idea that violent video games drive real-world aggression is a popular one, but it hasn’t tested very well over time," professor Andrew Przybylski told the University of Oxford. "Despite the interest in the topic by parents and policy-makers, the research has not demonstrated that there is cause for concern. Part of the problem in technology research is that there are many ways to analyse the same data, which will produce different results. A cherry-picked result can add undue weight to the moral panic surrounding video games. The registered study approach is a safeguard against this." 

We can tell confidently, due to these results, that violent video game engagement does not statistically significant or practically significant correlate to aggressive behaviour. Speaking the human language, the relations between these two indicators are weak and not useful. If people are aggressive, they behave like this always and thanks to different reasons — games have nothing to do with that. 

So don't be afraid. Yet there are situations when you feel anger while playing MOBAs (yeah, verbal abuses and stuff, you know that), shooters (damn cheaters), — even Monopoly, the offline tabletop game, with its 'dice luck' always turning against you. The main thing is to stay calm. It all comes from you — the less aggression you show, the more people won't be bothered with it, the better the community will become. So just manage yourself in a good way inside the game — the real world will reflect. 

And if you are interested in the study itself — check the Royal Society Open Science journal site.