As per a research, which has been published in the journal Psychology and Popular Media Culture, it has been revealed that environmental factor is also an important factor to determine the impulsive behavior of children.

Lead researcher Douglas A. Gentile of Iowa State University, said that they have especially concentrated on environmental factors. This factor has made their study different from other researches, being conducted to know the factors affecting attention and behavior of children.

Gentile said that they have found that electronic media and video games make children develop impulsivity and attention difficulties. Their research has revealed that children, who are hooked to video gaming, face greater level of attention difficulties.

Things get even worse if children are addicted to play violent video games, said Gentile. “This is an important finding because most research on attention problems has focused on biological and genetic factors rather than on environmental factors”, said he.

In order to reach at the given conclusion, the study researchers collected and assessed the data of 3,034 children. All children were aged between eight and 17 years and were from 12 different schools of Singapore. They were asked to fill questionnaires in regard to their video gaming habit.

Gentile said that they gave questionnaires four times in different years, that is when they were studying in third, fourth, seven and eighth class. After assessing their survey, it has been revealed that video games play a big role in inducing impulsive behavior in children. It is also the reason of poor concentration level in children.

Some of the other problems, which have been witnessed during the study, lack of attention, changes in behavior, low concentration in studies, and inability to identify goals.