A University of Canterbury study has found increased weaponization in Lego toys. (Ricky Young)

First, they found an uptick in angry faces on Lego mini-figures. Now, researchers in New Zealand have spotted another trend in the popular toy — increased weaponization.

Since the first Lego weapons came out in 1978, the percentage of sets including weapon pieces has grown from 1 percent of sets released that year to 29 percent of sets released in 2014, according to a study last month from the University of Canterbury in Christchurch.

The report looked at the weapons released each year and the violence depicted in Lego product catalogs. It found that both increased significantly since the 1970s.


Fans and toy dealers defended the Denmark toy manufacturer, most arguing that the toy industry as a whole is more violent and that toys like pellet guns are more worrisome than Lego weapons.

According to the researchers, nearly 30 percent of Lego sets today have at least one weapon piece, and that doesn’t include self-styled weapons that can be built using multiple Legos.

(Beto Alvarez)

“The Lego Company’s products are not as innocent as they used to be,” the study said.


Many of the upticks in Lego weapons correspond to the release of new themes, according to the study.

The first weapons — a sword, a halberd and a lance — were part of the castle theme. In the late 1980s, the pirate theme produced handguns and cannons. While the Star Wars series, released in 1999, only introduced one weapon — the lightsaber — it later added more weapons in the form of rifles and blasters in 2007, according to the study.

To analyze violence in the product catalogs, researchers asked people to rate the pages that showed how kids might use the different sets. They found that 20 percent of the catalog’s pages from 1980 were rated moderately or brutally violent. For the pages from the 2015 catalog, that number jumped to 58 percent.

“The violence in Lego products seems to have gone beyond just enriching game play,” the study concluded.


The study said the issue is likely not limited to Legos.

“Within the spectrum of available products today, Lego sets might still be comparatively or relatively harmless. The question remains, though, why violence has increased so much in general,” it said.

The study pointed out that other entertainment meant for kids, from television shows to G-rated movies, has grown more violent as well. It also acknowledged that research into how violent entertainment affects kids has been mixed.

While some researchers tell parents not to buy violent toys for their children because of the values that instills in the kids, according to the study, others actually use toy guns in play therapy and see benefits from “playful aggressive behavior.”


(Beto Alvarez)

Michelle M. Camacho, a sociology professor at University of San Diego, said she thinks the amount of violence in toys marketed to young boys is a problem.

“Some scholars have argued that the proliferation of increasingly violent toys relates to a broader issue, a crisis of masculinity,” she said. “As weapons become more commonplace in video games and media, they are losing the association with brutality and losing the association with the horrors of war. At the same time, we are seeing a rise in all kinds of shootings in public domains.”

While she said the increase in Lego weapons is part of the more general trend in boys’ toys, Camacho said that she doesn’t think of Legos as violent toys and has encouraged her children to play with them because they help develop design and engineering skills.


Brian Miller, president of Geppetto’s Toys, said that he doesn’t carry violent toys like cap guns in his store. He doesn’t consider Legos violent, and he said his stores do a lot of business selling Legos.

A University of Canterbury study has found increased weaponization in Lego toys. (Ricky Young)

“I think the play value of the construction alone, and the focus that it requires to have a child go through the instructions of building something, the developmental benefits are so great for a child to do something independently and do a start-to-finish project where they can see the outcome of their hard work,” he said. “That alone is a great benefit of a Lego toy.”

He said his 13-year-old son spends hours building with Legos.


“I see imaginative play, but I wouldn’t categorize it as violent play at all,” he said of his son’s interactions.

Paul Lee, a member of Lego Users Group of Los Angeles, said he freelances as a comic book artist for the Lego Club magazine that Lego produces twice a month. He said the company is skittish about violent scenes.

A University of Canterbury study has found increased weaponization in Lego toys. (Ricky Young)

“Almost as a rule, I avoid drawing guns or anything like that,” Lee said. “They will just as soon ask me to take it out, and they’ve never asked me to put a gun in.”


He added that he has to be especially careful when drawing for European fans, especially Germans.

Parent Liana Neyer of Carlsbad, who is half Austrian and has spent summers in Europe, said that a Lego dinosaur set from 2006 that her family purchased while abroad was less weaponized than the American version. The dinosaurs were meant to be “attacked” in the U.S. set but “trapped” in the European one.

Neyer said that though she doesn’t like the upward trend toward weaponry, she’s not bothered by the overall level of violence in Lego products.

“I’ve never let my kids play video games because of the violence,” she said. “Looking through the (Lego) catalog, I don’t see anything that’s terribly alarming. It’s mostly fantasy play.”


Lego did not respond to requests for comment on the study.