With the current battles you have to expect things like this. The problem with studies and statistics is that no matter how impartial the people compiling them might claim to be, there is always an agenda involved. That's the thing with statistics in paticular, today especially it's a method for lying and misdirection, with people actually comissioning companies to produce statistics they can use to make a specific point.
To put things into perspective here, when it comes to this study in paticular key information is missing. For example: what are they defining as a baseline for normal behavior for a kid that these psychological problems deviate from?
See, to many liberals out there in paticular (and a lot of those making anti-video game arguements are embracing liberal sentiments) their perception of what is normal for a kid is a totally peaceful and passive child who experiences wonder and joy in the simplest things and has no comprehension of the evils of the world. That's a left wing Hollywood ideal of the perfect child and the innocence that needs to be protected.
The problem is that this only exists in Hollywood, and in the minds of people who wish things were that way. Humans are violent, kids in paticular are violent and cruel as they have poor impulse control being young. Bullying, temper tantrums, and even hurting animals (within certain parameters) are all fairly normal behaviors. A quintessential example of this is a kid torturing and killing ants casually with a magnifying glass (the subject of things like the movie "The Ant Bully" and Steven Kings "Under The Dome"). While disturbing from the perspective of adults (which is where some of the fiction about it comes from) this is all perfectly normal behavior, an why parents need to you know... engage in parenting and teach impulse control and so on.
Teenagers probably represent the worst period, and always have. Your dealing with a time between childhood and adulthood where the kids have a high level of abillity both physical and mentally, and more self control than younger children but still lacking compared to adults. This is also when the worst excesses have ALWAYS occured.
People talk about the violence today, but it's mostly a matter of the news making it so violent incidents are piped into homes in real time. Very little is kept under the rug. People tend to forget that books like "Rumblefish" were socially relevent because Rumbles (large groups of kids fighting it out) indeed did happen. While sexed up for Hollywood kids racing vehicles dangerously (playing Chicken, and similar things) were also fairly common at one time. Every generation has had it's crap, and it's youth violence and fatalities, you just hear about it more nowadays. Same bullshit, differant generation. Instead of "the devil music" (going back to old time Rock and Roll) people blame video games and TV.
When it comes to things like video games and TV causing a lack of physical activity and health problems, one also has to inquire as to what other factors were involved in the study. Remember that we live in a society right now where kids generally can't roam the streets freely anymore, especially not young children. We've become more aware of the dangers (which I think were always present) from child molesters and random freaks. Not to mention liability issues where nobody wants unattended children around, even at a playground or whatever, where someone could be found liable for an injury. In today's world there are no "homemakers" anymore for the most part, neither parent stays home to take responsibility for rearing the children, and all arguements about gender roles aside, the simple fact is that the current economy has changed to the point where most households need two incomes. That means adults are less likely to be able to take their kids outside to play and similar things.
The TV and Video Game systems are ways for kids to keep themselves occupied in light of what the world is like, to some extent it's a matter of us simply being less naive than we once were. To change things in this regard requires a lot of massive modifications to the very fabric of our society and how it works. Nobody wants to open the doors so like always, we need scapegoats, and Video Games/TV are the current Boogie Men. As things get worse and the big problems go unresolved with people noticing it more, the people cry for something to be done without having to themselves change radically, hence the current attacks and attempt to create regulation which will do nothing.
At any rate, the basic point (for those who read this far) is simply that the study is likely BS. If you examime it you'd likely find it was working from a flawed basis to begin with, both in terms of normal youth behavior (kids behaving badly has been part of human existance basically forever), and in making assumptions that other forms of recreation were viable. Could the kid conceivably have been outside doing other things besides games? What would they be doing? Where would they be going? Depending on the age, who would be doing the supervising? These are all valid questions before this study could even begin to collect any kind of valid and unbiased information.
