The amount of gun violence displayed in PG-13 films has more than tripled since 1985, the year in which the rating was introduced, a new study has showed.
According to the study, in fact, popular PG-13 movies of 2011 and 2012 showed more gun violence than R-rated movies of the same time period.
Co-author Brad Bushman, professor of communication and psychology at The Ohio State University, said that it's shocking how gun use has skyrocketed in movies that are often marketed directly at the teen audience.
He said that people have to wonder why we are seeing this surge in gun violence in PG-13 movies, when it isn't appearing in G, PG and R-rated films.
Bushman said the results are concerning because other research has revealed the presence of a "weapons effect": People who simply see a gun, or even a picture of a gun, are more aggressive toward others.
The researchers studied a database of 915 films that were drawn from the 30 top-grossing films for each year from 1950 to 2012. Researchers identified violent sequences performed by each character for each five-minute segment of the films.
They also noted whether each violent sequence since 1985 (the first full year after the PG-13 rating was introduced) included the use of a gun.
Overall, findings showed that the rate of violent sequences nearly quadrupled from 1950 to 2010. Since 1985, 94 percent of the movies studied (367 in total) had one or more five-minute segments that included violence. Overall, the films contained 700 segments with gun violence.
Findings showed that R-rated films averaged about 1.54 segments per hour featuring gun violence, and that number didn't fluctuate much from 1985 to 2010. Movies rated G and PG averaged 0.41 segments of gun violence per hour, which also hasn't changed since 1985.
The study has been published online in the journal Pediatrics.
