Wielding the power to heal: Exploring how online gaming community participation fosters resilience and recovery among Chinese gamers

Game peripherals refer to the input-output devices assisting players to interact with video games. An interesting phenomenon related to game peripherals is bringing your own peripherals (BYOP) which means video game players, especially the advanced players, usually tend to use their own devices to play video games. An important reason for the popularity of BYOP is the players’ belief that the best tools to play the game are their own devices, in terms of game experience and performance. Thus, the game peripherals used in the BYOP situation imply the excellent quality. However, the limited research on the game peripherals leads to the lacking understanding of what determines the good game peripherals and how the good game peripherals influence players’ positive gaming experience and their performance. In order to call for more attention to the research on game peripherals and players’ cognition, this paper focuses on two important dimensions of game peripherals (i.e., controller fit and vividness of interfaces) and their influences on players’ positive in-game experience (i.e., sense of control, immersion and enjoyment). Furthermore, this research also discusses the relationship between positive gaming experience and in-game performance. A relational framework including seven propositions is proposed to guide and suggest future research on the game peripherals’ influences and the positive gaming experience in the field of player-video game interaction.

This chapter presents a critical review of contemporary scholarship on girls, video gaming, and literacies with a global focus on girls and women of color who only recently have been given explicit attention by game scholars. Studies included surveys or quantitative studies to examine females’ attitudes toward and identities in gaming; mixed-methods studies, interviews; life stories; and virtual ethnographies to describe female gamers’ experiences in gaming. Studies explored the out-of-school gameplay experiences of girls of color and tended to emphasize players’ responses to feminine or racial stereotypes in games or discrimination in online gaming communities and girls’ coping mechanisms and strategies of resistance to oppression. Some girls and women of color developed and sustained interest in gaming through supportive game play with family members or friends. Other girls made their own games as a means of rewriting game characters or story lines that they perceived to be stereotypical or oppressive. This review suggests how video game play can provide girls of color with opportunities for self-expression, strengthen social bonds, and challenge normative sexist and racist representations.

To investigate the impacts of social support and psychological detachment on nurses' job burnout, as well as to validate psychological detachment's mediating effect. The study was conducted using a questionnaire-based cross-sectional design. From October 2023 to March 2024, convenience sampling was used to distribute electronic questionnaires (including a general information questionnaire, the Maslach Burnout Inventory, the Psychological Detachment Scale, and the Social Support Scale) to investigate the current state of job burnout, psychological detachment, and social support among nurses. A total of 325 nurses were included in the study. The statistical analysis was performed using SPSS 29.0 software and the SPSS Process 4.1 plug-in. Results showed that both social support and psychological detachment were negatively correlated with job burnout. Excluding general demographic characteristics, social support was negatively associated with job burnout through psychological detachment, where psychological detachment mediated social support and emotionally exhausting job burnout with a mediating effect of 8.93%. Nurses' job burnout can be mitigated by both social support and psychological detachment, with psychological detachment acting as a mediation of the effect of social support. Nursing managers should take measures to enhance the social support of nurses appropriately. At the same time, it is necessary to arrange work reasonably and establish a solid communication mechanism to improve nurses' psychological detachment and reduce nurses' job burnout. No patient or public involvement.

Investigating the Factors Affecting Community Participation to Respond to the Crisis of Covide-19

Existing literature has primarily evaluated how exposure to video game content impacts social and behavioral functioning. However, the parameters of video game engagement have expanded with multiplayer online gaming, live streaming, and community discussion on social media platforms. This study sought to examine how participation in online gaming communities is associated with problematic gaming behaviors and symptoms of Internet gaming disorder (IGD). A sample of 1176 gamers completed an online survey investigating game habits, community involvement, and gaming preferences as measured by both the Game Community of Inquiry Scale (GCoIS) and the Internet Gaming Disorder Scale-Short form (IGDS9-SF). Results from a multiple hierarchical regression indicated several predictors of problematic gaming, including both community attractiveness and community receptiveness. Moreover, data showed that younger gamers and non-normative gamers were more vulnerable to problematic gaming and more severe symptoms of IGD.

This study investigated the effects of trait-level hostility, interface types, and character identification on aggressive thoughts and overall game experience after playing a violent video game. Results showed that the mapping interface made participants with high trait-level hostility more readily accessible to aggressive contracts, yet it did not have any significant impact for participants with low trait-level hostility. Participants with low trait-level hostility reported more positive game experience in the mapping interface condition, while participants with high trait-level hostility in the same condition reported more negative game experience. Results also indicated that character identification has moderating effects on activating aggressive thoughts and mediating effects on overall game experience. Implications regarding possible ways of reducing potentially negative outcomes from violent games are discussed.

In this article, we examine how a Latinx eight-year-old child’s participation in an online gaming community supported his involvement in a way of learning termed Learning by Observing and Pitching In (LOPI). Specifically, we focus on how the way that the online gaming community was organized allowed the child to be incorporated to contribute to a range of the online gaming community’s activities. In the two examples, we reveal how the child leveraged digital tools to coordinate fluidly and complete shared endeavours with others in his gaming environments. Moreover, through in-depth analyses of the child’s video gaming activity, we argue that children learn by observing gamer-produced media and pitch in to online gaming communities through their gameplay. As such, the article has implications for how children participate through LOPI in virtual communities through their everyday media practices. We end with a discussion on how contexts organized around play, such as online gaming communities, can be fruitful sites of learning in which children develop digital literacies by observing and pitching in.

This paper presents a preliminary model proposal for the analysis of video game level scenarios consisting of four elements: video game, players, metrics, and gaming experience. The selection of parameters from each of these elements defines a specific video game level analysis context. Initial validation of the model is being carried out with a First-person shooter video game and selected metrics (including eye movement behavior) to understand player behavior (both interactive and visual) within a game level. An additional analysis technique based on visual representation techniques applied in this validation context is also described. After validated, this model may be applied in the analysis of player behavior in game levels, in several different situations predicted in the model itself. Information acquired from the application of this model may posteriorly be used in the design (or redesign) of game levels and scenarios driven for optimal use which should generate a greater gaming experience.

ABSTRACTApplied to video games, Csikszentmihalyi’s work on flow evidences that a positive gaming experience is intrinsically self-rewarding and primarily determined by the skill/challenge balance. A multi-layered measure of enjoyment is built to take these components into account. Gamers were asked to report the concentration-enjoyment they experienced during a first-person shooter game, and to better assess the gap between skill and challenge, the challenge enjoyment was also rated. Along with concentration level, concentration enjoyment is used to build a gaming experience typology that accounts for the self-rewarding component. An enjoyment-based challenge mapping is also drawn up, crossing challenge enjoyment and challenge level. The results show that this integrative enjoyment measure strengthens the causal link between challenge and gaming experience. Most importantly, the findings suggest that challenge or concentration-based enjoyment measures outweigh the standard concentration and difficulty measures as they are more likely to ensure a pleasant and positive experience (flow or relaxation) for the gamers. Indeed, regardless of the reported level of challenge, a gamer is more likely to have a positive experience when challenged at a level she perceives as pleasant. This article emphasizes the importance for game publishers of gathering enjoyment-based concentration and challenge assessments to ensure a positive gaming experience and gamers’ commitment.

The main purpose of this study was to explore if there were differences among the teachers’ playfulness, their perceptions of the students’ online gaming motivation, emotion, learning, and the teacher-student game-related relationship owing to teachers’ own experiences in online games. The participants were 723 teachers from the elementary schools, junior high schools, and senior (vocational) high schools in all areas of Taiwan. The surveys used in this study included the Inventory of Teacher Playfulness, the Inventory of Students’ Online Gaming Motivation, the Inventory of Students’ Online Gaming Positive and Negative Emotion, the Inventory of Students’ Online Gaming Learning, and the Inventory of Teacher-Student Game-related Relationship. The applied analysis methods were confirmatory factor analysis, t-test and one-way ANOVA. The main findings of this study were as follow: 1.In the dimension of “enjoyment of trying and satisfaction obtaining” among the teachers’ playfulness, teachers who have some online gaming experience were higher than those teachers who have little gaming experiences. 2.In the perceptions of students’ motivation in “role-playing” and “manipulation” among the students’ gaming motivation, non-player-teachers were higher than player-teachers 3.The teachers’ with different online gaming experiences showed no significant difference in the students’ gaming emotion, neither in a positive nor in a negative way. 4.In terms of students’ game-related learning, teachers with ordinary gaming experiences were higher in their perceptions of social relationship dimension than teachers without gaming experiences, teachers with little gaming experiences, and teachers with some gaming experiences 5.In terms of the online gaming relationship between teachers and students, player teachers was better than non-player teachers. Teachers with some gaming experiences, teachers with ordinary gaming experiences, and teachers with lots of gaming experiences were better than teachers without gaming experiences. Teachers with ordinary gaming experiences, and teachers with lots of gaming experiences were also better than teachers with some gaming experiences and teachers with little gaming experiences. 6.In terms of teachers’ demographic variables, there existed significant differences in the students’ negative gaming emotion, achievement and escapism of the students’ gaming motivation, satisfaction, social relationship, and organization management and creation of the students’ gaming learning, and the online gaming relationship between teachers and students. However, there’s no significant difference in teachers’ playfulness and the students’ positive gaming emotion. This study discussed the results based on above statistical findings, and proposed some suggestions for teachers and for future studies.

In this digital era, the entertainment industry began to be enriched by the presence of the online gaming industry. In Indonesia, video games that were once considered as a hobby, now have turned into commodities with millions hundred dollar profits per year. The online game industry cannot be separated from the role of stakeholders, including the audience as consumers. The audiences or consumers of the online game industry are active members of the online game community that shares the same perceptions, principles, values, and interests by playing online games. In this article, the author aims to describe the role of the online game industry in creating a community, both virtual (online) community or real community (offline), and describing various business and industrial potentials that exist within the online game community. The findings in this article are: 1) The online game industry in Indonesia plays a role in forming an online and offline community that considered as an important community by the Indonesian government and society in general. 2) Through activity in the online and offline communities, gamers can take advantages of their hobbies as a way to generate financial benefits, 3) The potential of business in the online gaming community can significantly help the development of the online game industry. The results of this study suggest the development of scientific research on the online gaming industry, so it can provide a significant influence on the development of the online game industry.

Background: Physical inactivity has been identified as the fourth leading cause of death globally. It is now well established that a sedentary lifestyle is a unique risk factor for several diseases such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, which account for about 30% of global mortality. Diabetes is a major preventable cause of costly and debilitating renal failure, heart disease, lower limb amputation, and avoidable blindness. In recent years, the idea of using interactive computing systems that leverage gamification to promote physical activity has been widely researched. Prior studies have shown that exergames, that is those that encourage physical activity, can increase enjoyment and intrinsic motivation compared with conventional exercises; as such, they can be effective in promoting physical and mental health. There has been some research on immersive virtual reality (VR) exergames; however, to the best of our knowledge, it is limited and preliminary. This work aims at filling the gap and investigates the effect of display type (DT) and viewing perspective (VP) on players' exertion, engagement, and overall game experience in immersive VR exergames. Objective: This article aims at examining whether DT and VP can affect gameplay performance, players' exertion, game experience, cybersickness, and electroencephalography (EEG) engagement index when playing a gesture-based (i.e., body motion) exergame. Materials and Methods: Study 1 employed a one-way between-subjects design with 24 participants equally distributed in two groups (immersive VR and 50-inch TV) to perform 12 pre-defined gestures. The main outcome measures were National Aeronautics and Space Administration-Task Load Index (NASA-TLX) workload for each group as well as 7 Likert scale and EEG engagement index for each gesture. Study 2 included 16 participants in playing a game with the gestures selected from study 1. All participants played 4 versions based on combinations of DT (immersive VR and 50-inch TV) and VP (first-person and third-person) to assess exertion (%HRmax, calories consumption, and Borg RPE 6-20), game experience, cybersickness, and EEG engagement index. Results: Study 1 results showed that DT had no effect on the ratings of the gestures, NASA-TLX workload, and EEG engagement index. Study 2 results showed that immersive VR not only resulted in a significantly higher exertion (%HRmax, calories consumption, and Borg RPE) but also helped achieve better positive game experience in challenge, flow, sensory and imaginative immersion, as well as lower negative affect. We also found that nausea and oculomotor were significantly higher in immersive VR. Conclusion: This pilot study demonstrates that youth who played gesture-based exergame in immersive VR had a higher level of exertion (%HRmax, calories consumption, and Borg RPE), although the number of performed gestures were not significantly different. They also felt that immersive VR was much more challenging, immersive (flow, sensory and imaginative immersion), and had a lower negative affect than a 50-inch TV; however, immersive VR was more likely to make youth have higher cybersickness.

Media and Child Health

Purpose Increases in video game use have led to mental health concerns, citing greater risk for depressive symptoms (DS) and reduced “in-real-life” (IRL) social involvement. However, recent studies have uncovered potential social benefits for online gaming. Many games provide avenues to extend real life relationships and make new online friendships. The purpose of this pilot study is to use social network analysis to determine associations between connections and DS in a gaming community. Design/methodology/approach As a pilot study, members of an online gaming site were asked to report demographic characteristics, DS, IRL social support, online social support and IRL people and members of the online community with whom they spoke to about important life matters. Multi-level modeling was used to parse variance described by demographic characteristics, IRL measures and online measures. Linear network autocorrelation modeling (LNAM) was used to determine relationships between network connections and DS. Findings Members (n = 37; µ = 24.76 years old, SD = 6.55; 100% male; 89.2% white) on average felt DS’ “not at all” to “several days” over the past two weeks. Multi-level modeling including online network measures explained 50% of variance (R2 = 0.50, F (9,27) = 2.98, p = 0.01); online connections were associated with DS (ß = 0.46). LNAM indicated DS were associated with IRL support (ß = −2.66), IRL connections (ß = 1.81), online support (ß = 2.40) and network effects (ß = 0.06), which indicates that a gamer’s DS were similar to those of their online connections. Originality/value Members with more DS may be seeking help via online channels. This may be important for future research to consider alternative forms of help-seeking behavior.

Research has repeatedly demonstrated that the use of interactive media is associated with recovery experiences, suggesting that engaging with media can help people to alleviate stress and restore mental and physical resources. Video games, in particular, have been shown to fulfil various aspects of recovery, not least due to their ability to elicit feelings of mastery and control. However, little is known about the role of cognitive task demand (i.e., the amount of cognitive effort a task requires) in that process. Toward this end, our study aimed to investigate how cognitive task demand during gameplay affects users’ recovery experiences. Results of a laboratory experiment suggest that different dimensions of the recovery experiences seem to respond to different levels of cognitive task demand. While control experiences were highest under low cognitive task demand, there was no difference between groups regarding experiences of mastery and psychological detachment. Nevertheless, both gaming conditions outperformed the control condition regarding experiences of mastery and psychological detachment. Controlling for personal gaming experiences, relaxation was higher in the low cognitive task demand condition compared to the control condition. Findings are discussed in terms of their implications for research on the multilayered recovery effects of interactive media.