Consumer research group Nielsen has published a study that helps to explain why every time I log onto Xbox Live I get so many squeaky voices squealing profanity at me through my home theater system. They studied the playing habits of gamers from April 2007 until Februrary 2007 and found an interesting breakdown of console usage by age.

The Xbox 360 was the most popular amongst gamers ages 10-26, with just under 63% of their total play time being on the Microsoft console. The Wii came in second place with almost 25% of total usage time. The Playstation 3 was the least used, with just over 12% of their gaming time being on the newest console. Things were almost completely reversed for the 27+ age group. The Playstation 3 was the top dog here at almost 52% of the total game time. The Wii was once again in second with 28% of the play time followed by the Xbox 360 at roughly 20%.

Most of the other findings weren’t much of a surprise. Across the board the 10-26 age group used their consoles for longer periods of time per day, although the Wii was almost equal for both (average of 53 minutes for the younger group, 47 for the older). The younger group also had more days per month of usage for each console.

This study could use repeating at a later date, as many of the top-quality titles for the PS3 are more recent than a year ago, but it’s certainly interesting to speculate if the Xbox 360 really holds some appeal to younger gamers. It could be that the PS3 was more commonly used amongst older gamers because it’s more expensive and more recent. While gamers in their twenties might have an easy time purchasing whichever consoles or games they want, there’s probably a decent number of younger kids who can’t seem to convince their parents to buy them a second (or third), more expensive game console. There’s also probably a good number of older gamers who recently purchased a flatscreen television and convinced their spouse/girlfriend/significant other that the PS3 was a good buy due to its intersection between affordability and quality when it comes to Blu-ray players.