Now all those Thompson supporters can be shut up about violent FPS games making players violent. Research has shown that driving and even table tennis games make players more agitated and aggressive.

Dr Simon Goodson and Sarah Pearson of Huddersfield University recorded the physical and mental changes of thirty gamers, aged 18-45, when playing Xbox 360 games from three different genres: driving, first-person shooter, and a table tennis game.

The results showed that the driving games caused the greatest changes in heart rate and brain activity related to aggression, with the FPS game inducing the smallest changes. Oh yes, table tennis games make you more aggressive than shooters.

Dr Goodson and Sarah Pearson commented: “Previous researchers have made sweeping generalizations about the nature of video games. This study is one of the first to use one of the latest games consoles that have a much higher level of realism.

“Surprisingly the results showed that the driving game made participants more agitated and aggressive than the game with graphic violence. Given the high levels of realism in modern games a re-evaluation of the relationship between video games and violence is needed.”

Tags: Driving, gaming, pyschology, shooters, violence

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3 Comments » Binkery on April 1, 2009 8:01 pm Those gosh darn racing games! With this the attention can go away from GTA and move on to Table Tennis… oh wait it's still Rockstars fault haha Sam Naylor on April 1, 2009 8:54 pm Not surprised, after those bloody license tests in Gran Turismo. kimberley on June 18, 2009 1:30 am having had my son just put his foot through the bedroom door following Chad Reed mx unleashed – I believe this study RSS feed for comments on this post. Comment Now Note: Commenting on Ripten does not currently require registration, however to be eligible for contests on the site, you must be a registered user. Name (required) Mail (will not be published) (required) Website Commenting Rules: No hate speech allowed. If you must argue, please debate intelligently. Comments containing selected keywords or outbound links will be put into moderation to help prevent spam. Ripten reserves the right to delete comments and ban anyone who doesn't follow the rules. Thanks. Notify me of followup comments Tired of the Goomba? Upload your own custom comment avatar.