The DOI matches its Crossref record; 64 of the 64 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Overstated evidence for short-term effects of violent games on affect and behavior: A reanalysis of Anderson et al. (2010).
Open accessAbstract
Violent video games are theorized to be a significant cause of aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Important evidence for this claim comes from a large meta-analysis by Anderson and colleagues (2010), who found effects of violent games in experimental, cross-sectional, and longitudinal research. In that meta-analysis, the authors argued that there is little publication or analytic bias in the literature, an argument supported by their use of the trim-and-fill procedure. In the present manuscript, we reexamine their meta-analysis using a wider array of techniques for detecting bias and adjusting effect sizes. Our conclusions differ from those of Anderson and colleagues in 3 salient ways. First, we detect substantial publication bias in experimental research on the effects of violent games on aggressive affect and aggressive behavior. Second, after adjustment for bias, the effects of violent games on aggressive behavior in experimental research are estimated as being very small, and estimates of effects on aggressive affect are much reduced. In contrast, the cross-sectional literature finds correlations that appear largely unbiased. Third, experiments meeting the original authors' criteria for methodological quality do not yield larger adjusted effects than other experiments, but instead yield larger indications of bias, indicating that perhaps they were selected for significance. We outline future directions for stronger experimental research. The results indicate th…
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In the citing paper
“this analysis also suggested that studies originally deemed to be following best practices showed particularly strong evidence of publication bias.”
From Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents' aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
In the citing paper
“Upon adjusting for publication bias, the observed aggregate effect sizes relating gaming to aggression were smaller than those originally presented.”
From Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents' aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
In the citing paper
“The existing literature suggests that the effect linking violent video game play to aggressive behaviour in cross-sectional research (n = 29 113) is approximately r = 0.21 (95% CI = 0.20–0.22).”
From Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents' aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
In the citing paper
“Given this effect, r = 0.01 (95% CI = −0.08 to 0.10), did not overlap with, and was clearly inferior to, r = 0.21 (95% CI = 0.20–0.22)”
From Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents' aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
In the citing paper
“Their analysis detected the presence of publication bias not uncovered in the original reporting of the data.”
From Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents' aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
In the citing paper
“because we prespecified how we would interpret effects larger, smaller or falling in the same range as estimates from meta-analysis [32]”
From Violent video game engagement is not associated with adolescents' aggressive behaviour: evidence from a registered report (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
Citations
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Anderson, C. A., Shibuya, A., Ihori, N., Swing, E. L., Bushman, B. J., Sakamoto, A., Rothstein, H. R., & Saleem, M. (2010) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/a0018251 · Cited by 2,048
HARKing: Hypothesizing after the results are known
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Correcting for Bias in Psychology: A Comparison of Meta-Analytic Methods
Carter, E. C., Schönbrodt, F. D., Gervais, W. M., & Hilgard, J. (2019) · Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/2515245919847196 · Cited by 588
Self-citationMedia Use Is Linked to Lower Psychological Well-Being: Evidence from Three Datasets
Twenge, J. M., & Campbell, W. K. (2019) · Psychiatric Quarterly · doi:10.1007/s11126-019-09630-7 · Cited by 429
Sensitivity Analysis for Publication Bias in Meta-Analyses
Mathur, M. B., & VanderWeele, T. J. (2020) · Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C: Applied Statistics · doi:10.1111/rssc.12440 · Cited by 354
“…could be explained away by publication bias; other researchers suggested that publication bias might largely explain these results (Ferguson and Kilburn, 2010; Hilgard et al., 2017), whereas the original authors argued that the results were in fact robust to publication bias (Kepes et al., 2017).)”
ResultWhen and How Video Games Can Be Good: A Review of the Positive Effects of Video Games on Well-Being
Halbrook, Y. J., O’Donnell, A. T., & Msetfi, R. M. (2019) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/1745691619863807 · Cited by 263
Beyond Screen Time: Identity Development in the Digital Age
Granic, I., Morita, H., & Scholten, H. (2020) · Psychological Inquiry · doi:10.1080/1047840x.2020.1820214 · Cited by 237
Metadata
- Authors
- Hilgard, J., Engelhardt, C. R., & Rouder, J. N.
- Affiliations
- University of Pennsylvania (US)
- University of Missouri (US)
- Venue
- Psychological Bulletin
- Published
- 2017-07
- Volume
- 143
- Issue
- 7
- Pages
- 757-774
- ISSN
- 0033-2909 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1455
- OpenAlex
- W2633438608
- Semantic Scholar
- 2a45c07624c58a274ddadd219b25c3f2a23ac534
- Cited by
- 162
- References
- 64
- Citations by year
- 2026: 11 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 15 · 2023: 17 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 25 · 2020: 22 · 2019: 20 · 2018: 17 · 2017: 7
- FWCI
- 25.90
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Psychological Bulletin (publishedVersion, other-oa)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Annenberg Public Policy Center
- National Science Foundation (BCS-1240359 and SES-102408)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Bullying, Victimization, and Aggression
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Digital Games and Media
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Statistics, Probability and Uncertainty › Meta-analysis and systematic reviews
- Keywords
- violent video games, aggression, aggressive affect, publication bias, research bias, trim and fill, methodological quality, preregistration, reanalysis
- MeSH terms
- Aggression, Humans, Violence, Meta-Analysis as Topic, Publication Bias, Video Games
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