CNN
Republished with permission

January 14, 2001 - A Stanford University study suggests that decreased time spent watching television and playing video games can make children less aggressive.

Lead researcher and pediatrics professor Dr. Thomas Robinson says the results indicate that "the effects of television violence in kids are really reversible."

Third- and fourth-grade children at two California elementary schools were asked to report the amount of time spent watching TV and videos and playing video games. Students were challenged to abstain from TV and video games for 10 days, then asked to restrict TV-watching and video game-playing to seven hours a week.

Children were then asked to rate their classmates' aggression at the beginning of the study (September 1996) and at the end of the study (April 1997). Robinson says there were about 25 per cent fewer reports of aggression in the test group than in the control group.

The authors of the study have acknowledged that there are limitations to their study. For instance, the researchers did not assess the content of the programs and games kids watched.

The study is published in the January 2001 issue of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.