Exercise: Does Eliminating Video Games Increase Physical Activity?

A three year study of Australian pre-teens replaced sedentary video games (played with a gamepad/joystick) with either active video games that require physical movement or no video games at all to see if either increased daily moderate or vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and/or decreased sedentary time. When the study concluded, researchers did not find a significant change in either the children’s MVPA (+3.2 minutes/day for active games and +3.8 minutes/day for no games) or sedentary time (-6.2 minutes/day for active games and -4.7 minutes/day for no games). British Medical Journal Open, July 2013