Video game playing time and problem behaviors in children: A large Japanese nationwide longitudinal study

Increasing video game time is a public health issue, and there is a growing trend toward restricting gameplay from childhood. Given that the relationship between video game playing time and problem behaviors remains unclear, we examined the association in children.

Using a national survey that includes all infants born in Japan on January 10 and 17, and July 10 and 17, 2001, we analyzed data from 28126 participants to examine the relationship between video game playing time at 7 years old and the four types of problem behaviors at 8 years old (i.e., unsociability, fights with friends, school refusal, and poor academic performance). We estimated odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for problem behaviors, adjusting for sex, friends, siblings, maternal age at delivery, maternal educational attainment, developmental disorder tendency, unsociability, fights with friends, school refusal, and poor academic performance at 7 years old.

Playing video games for < 1 hour/day at the age of 7 years was associated with lower odds of unsociability at 8 years old (OR 0.86; 95% CI 0.75-0.99) than playing no video games. Playing video games for ≥ 2 hours/day was associated with higher odds of fights with friends (OR 1.51; 95% CI 1.02-2.24) and school refusal (OR 1.90; 95% CI 1.09-3.30) than playing no video games.

Our findings suggest that problem behaviors may differ according to the duration of game play in young children.