Correlates of video game screen time among males: Body mass, physical activity, and other media use
Section snippets
Literature review
Video game play is a ubiquitous activity in industrialized countries, particularly among males (Nielson Company, 2007, Yee, 2006). Research on the correlates and experimental impact of video game play primarily has focused on aggression (see Ballard, Hamby, Panee, & Engold, 2006 for a review). This study examines video game play among males in relation to body mass index, body fat percent, physical activity, and sedentary behavior. The link between media use and physical health correlates has
Participants
Participants included 116 male students (M age = 19.54; ethnicity: white n = 106; African American n = 5, Latino n = 1, Asian American n = 2, and 2 others). Most (72%) participants were non-smokers. Some (32%) participants self-reported that they are athletes. Most of the participants volunteered for the study by signing up for a computerized participant pool that offered them opportunities for research participation in the Psychology Department at Appalachian State University; they received either extra
Results
The primary data analyses consisted of Pearson correlation and linear regression analyses. These analyses are described following the descriptive statistics.
Discussion
The primary goal of this study was to examine the relationship between video game use and BMI, exercise, and other media use. We hypothesized that the video game use would be (a) significantly positively related to BMI, (b) negatively correlated with physical activity, and (c) positively correlated with other media use.
These hypotheses were partially supported. Those who typically engaged in longer sessions of video game play did have higher BMI. The strongest correlations were between BMI and
Role of Funding Sources
The Cratis D. Williams Graduate School at Appalachian State University provided financial support for the conduct of the research. The Graduate School had no role in the study design, collection, analysis or interpretation of the data, writing the manuscript, or the decision to submit the paper for publication.
Contributors
All of the authors contributed to the design of the study and to collecting data. Dr. Ballard and Melissa Gray conducted literature searches and Melissa Gray provided a summary of many of these articles and wrote a rough draft of the literature review. Dr. Ballard conducted the statistical analysis, wrote the formal paper, and prepared the manuscript for submission. Jenny Reilly and Matthew Noggle gave feedback on drafts of the submission. All authors contributed to and have approved the final
Conflict of Interest
All of the authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
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2021, Public HealthCitation Excerpt :This may be explained by the low proportion of girls that played as much videogames as boys, and they do not seem to play for enough time to impact sedentary behavior, LPA, and MVPA, whereas boys who play excessively have unhealthier patterns of these behaviors. A study with male undergraduates observed that frequency and length of videogame play were negatively associated with physical activity indicators.31 In addition, preferences in types and content of games could also explain the sex difference, as boys may, for example, prefer sports games, which are associated with increased physical activity compared with strategy games.31,32