Gaming Skill Research Articles

Video Game Skills across Diverse Genres and Cognitive Functioning in Early Adulthood: Verbal and Visuospatial Short-Term and Working Memory, Hand-Eye Coordination, and Empathy.

The cognitive and affective impacts of video games are subjects of ongoing debate, with recent research recognizing their potential benefits. This study employs the Gaming Skill Questionnaire (GSQ) to evaluate participants' gaming skills across six genres and overall proficiency. A total of 88 individuals aged 20-40 participated, completing assessments of empathy and six cognitive abilities: verbal short-term memory, verbal working memory, visuospatial short-term memory, visuospatial working memory, psychomotor speed (hand-eye coordination), and attention. Participants' cognitive abilities were examined using the Digit Span Test, Corsi Block Test, and Deary-Liewald Reaction Time Task, while empathy was assessed using the Empathy Quotient Questionnaire. Findings indicate that higher levels of videogaming proficiency are linked to improvements in visuospatial short-term and working memory, psychomotor speed, and attention. Specific genres enhanced particular skills: RPGs were positively associated with both verbal working memory and visuospatial short-term memory, but were negatively associated with empathy; action games improved psychomotor speed and attention; and puzzle games showed a positive relationship with visuospatial working memory. These results add to ongoing research on the cognitive and affective effects of video games, suggesting their potential to enhance specific cognitive functions. They also highlight the complex relationship between video games and empathy. Future research should explore the long-term impacts and genre-specific effects.

Validation of the Gaming Skills Questionnaire in Adolescence: Effects of Gaming Skills on Cognitive and Affective Functioning.

Given the widespread popularity of videogames, research attempted to assess their effects on cognitive and affective abilities, especially in children and adolescents. Despite numerous correlational studies, robust evidence on the causal relationship between videogames and cognition remains scarce, hindered by the absence of a comprehensive assessment tool for gaming skills across various genres. In a sample of 347 adolescents, this study aimed to develop and validate the Gaming Skill Questionnaire (GSQ) and assess the impact of gaming skills in six different genres (sport, first-person shooters, role-playing games, action-adventure, strategy, and puzzle games) on cognitive and affective abilities of adolescents. The GSQ exhibited strong reliability and validity, highlighting its potential as a valuable tool. Gaming skills positively affected executive function, memory, overall cognition, cognitive flexibility, and emotion recognition, except for empathy. Various game genres had different effects on cognitive and affective abilities, with verbal fluency influenced mainly by sports, executive functions by action, strategy, and puzzle, and emotion recognition positively impacted by action and puzzle but negatively by sports and strategy games. Both age and gaming skills influenced cognitive flexibility, with gaming having a greater effect. These intriguing genre-specific effects on cognitive and affective functioning postulate further research with GSQ's contribution.

Good video game players look better: exploring the relationship between game skills, sexual dimorphism, and facial attractiveness

Few studies have been done on the effects of video games on social perception, especially on the faces of players. The present study investigated how people’s gaming skill influences their perceived facial attractiveness, and also how sexual dimorphism features (masculine and feminine) interplayed with displayed gaming skill. We asked players (N = 147) and non-players (N = 167) to evaluate the attractiveness of masculinized and feminized facial images, along with perception of gaming skills (high gaming skill or low gaming skill). The results indicated that game players perceived facial images accompanied by higher gaming skill information were more attractive than facial images accompanied by lower gaming skill information. However, for participants without gaming experience (i.e., non-players), gaming skill information did not influence their evaluation of attractiveness. We believe players might consider higher gaming skills as social knowledge which can positively influence people’s perception of their attractiveness; on the other hand, non-players did not perceive gaming skills as important social knowledge, hence attractiveness ratings were unaffected. We did not find any interactions between sexual dimorphism features and gaming skill information. To our surprise, only non-players exhibited classic sexual dimorphism effects in facial evaluations, whereas for players, the sexual dimorphism effect disappeared completely. We speculate that players rely more on social knowledge and less on configuration cues during facial evaluation, hence the effects of sexual dimorphism were obscured.

Building a Behavioral Profile and Assessing the Skill of Video Game Players

Electronic sports (eSports) and video gaming is a rapidly evolving industry attracting billions of players and thousands professional eSports athletes worldwide. With the growing interest to this domain there is a number of challenges for players on how to progress from the amateur gaming level into the professional one and how one can characterize a professional eSports athlete and his skills. In this article, we present an answer to the essential eSports question – what underlies the players’ proficiency and defines a player as an individual distinguishing one from another. We address this problem by the investigation of the behavioral telemetry of players’ actions directly from the computer keyboard and mouse. This kind of data provides pristine characteristics of play style and represents the player’s mechanics in detail. In particular, we investigate: i) principle sequences of key controls pressed that the players use during the game, ii) sequences distinguishing the players among three groups: professionals, hardcore amateurs and casual players, iii) individual characteristics of players in different groups. To address these problems, we apply both unsupervised methods including Principal Component Analysis and supervised ensembles of Decision Trees with Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE) as feature selection technique. Our results show that the main principle factor of players’ key control mechanics reflects mostly “whether a player is a professional” rather than a general gaming skill.

The effect of computer mouse mass on target acquisition performance among action video gamers

Advances in human performance have shifted research attention from individuals towards understanding the effects that equipment can have on their performance. In esports, the effect of gaming peripherals on performance has only recently been explored. In this study, we investigated the effect of computer mouse mass on gaming skill. 72 video game players performed a target acquisition task, a pertinent composite skill in first-person shooter (FPS) video games, while using computer mice that varied only by their mass (50g, 60g, 90g & 100g). Results showed that participants were 4% faster and 9% more accurate with 50g, 60g, and 90g mice compared to the 100g mouse. They were also 34% more accurate and 14% more precise when using lower control-display gain and preferred lighter mice (50g and 60g) when performing the skill at a lower control-display gain. Taken together, using a lighter mouse at lower sensitivity may augment target acquisition performance among video gamers.

The structural characteristics of esports gaming and their behavioral implications for high engagement: A competition perspective and a cross-cultural examination

Esports has become one of the major online entertainment activities around the globe. Different from the previously dominant massively multiplayer online role-playing games, esports gaming has its unique structural characteristics, which substantially reshape the motivations, experiences, and behaviors of game users while raising new questions for research on Internet gaming disorder. In addition to identifying four structural characteristics of esports, the present study analyzed their implications from both theoretical and practical perspectives and conducted a cross-cultural examination by utilizing accurate and objective match history data of esports gamers in five different geographic regions (countries). Several findings of interest were obtained in this study. First, having in-game friend(s) in a premade team significantly increased gamers’ propensity to play consecutive matches. Second, whereas Nordic and Eastern European gamers tended to play additional matches following wins, Japanese gamers were inclined to do so after experiencing losses. Third, low and high-skilled gamers were more likely to engage in consecutive play than their middle-skilled counterparts. With a focus on the competitive nature of esports, this study demonstrated that the presence of friend(s), the outcome of the previous match, and the level of gaming skill can significantly influence esports gamers’ involvement.

Designing internet café as an electronic sport athletes boot camp in Bandung

The aim of the study is to create an innovation of the internet café become an internet boot camp café for the electronic sport athletes in Indonesia. The descriptive method is used to explain the data to the specific concept of the internet café boot camp. The material is processed to be created into the concepts of internet cafe as a boot camp for the electronic sport athletes. The result of this research showed that internet café as a boot camp for electronic sport athletes can creates an adequate place for the athletes to develop their gaming skill through some practices and training and create a comfortable atmosphere so the electronic athletes of Indonesia can fully concentrate and prepared for the E-Sport tournament not only in Asia but reaches Europe, America and Worldwide.

Master Maker: Understanding Gaming Skill Through Practice and Habit From Gameplay Behavior.

The study of expertise is difficult to do in a laboratory environment due to the challenge of finding people at different skill levels and the lack of time for participants to acquire mastery. In this paper, we report on two studies that analyze naturalistic gameplay data using cohort analysis to better understand how skill relates to practice and habit. Two cohorts are analyzed, each from two different games (Halo Reach and StarCraft 2). Our work follows skill progression through 7months of Halo matches for a holistic perspective, but also explores low-level in-game habits when controlling game units in StarCraft 2. Players who played moderately frequently without long breaks were able to gain skill the most efficiently. What set the highest performers apart was their ability to gain skill more rapidly and without dips compared to other players. At the beginning of matches, top players habitually warmed up by selecting and re-selecting groups of units repeatedly in a meaningless cycle. They exhibited unique routines during their play that aided them when under pressure.

Cognitive Load in Real-Time Strategy Gaming: Human Opponent Versus AI Opponent

This paper examines the cognitive load in real-time strategy gaming subjects along with physiological and subjective measurements. The subjects were college students from a northeastern university in China. This paper is a study into players’ cognitive load measurement when playing against human opponents and game artificial intelligences (game AIs). Using eye trackers, action per minute recorders and questionnaires, we collected qualitative data from participants about their cognitive load through playing against human opponents and game AI opponents. The results indicate that players have more cognitive load when playing against human opponents than against game AI opponents. Secondly, as the players’ gaming skill increased, their cognitive load did not differ substantially when they switched from playing against human players to playing against game AI opponents. A deeper understanding of players’ cognitive load can enable a developer to design a more appropriate game experience.

Should I stay or should I go? A Study of Pickup Groups in Left 4 Dead 2

In this article we report an autoethnographic study of pickup groups (PUGs) in the game Left 4 Dead 2 (L4D2). The study focuses on how PUGs as social arenas are constituted by their participants and the role game design plays in structuring interaction. We use Goffman’s idea that activities are surrounded by a metaphorical frame together with an understanding of gameplay design patterns in order to analyze inclusion and exclusion, social positions and the relation between the game context and the players’ “wider worlds.” In the case of L4D2 the design pattern of Symbiotic Player Relationships creates a social situation that puts extra pressure on the players to perform well and leads to issues of identity. By negotiating the boundary between their in-game identity, based on gaming skill, and other social relations outside of the game context, players can constitute a more stable game session. The study concludes with the tentative suggestion that positive perceptions of other players’ out-of-game identity can save a game from falling apart, yet negative perceptions of other players’ values and out-of-game identities pose no threat to the game activity.

Self-regulation and gender within a game-based learning environment.

In this study, we examined how self-regulated learning (SRL) and gender influences performance in an educational game for 8th-grade students (N = 130). Crystal Island–Outbreak is an immersive, inquiry-based, narrative-centered learning environment featuring a microbiology science mystery aligned with 8th-grade science curriculum. SRL variables predicted successful in-game performance even after accounting for prior knowledge and perceived gaming skill. Content learning gains were found across both genders, and girls performed at similar levels as boys in the game despite incoming disadvantages for perceived skill and prior gaming experience. Boys were more effective than girls in using a cognitive tool that was critical for solving the Crystal Island–Outbreak mystery; however, these differences disappeared when prior gaming experience was taken into account. Overconfidence on monitoring judgments for boys but not girls was predictive of in-game performance. Findings related to motivational variables such as self-efficacy, situational interest, and goal orientation were mixed with regard to their consistency across genders.

Acceptability of Video Games Technology for Medical Emergency Training

Using the technology acceptance model (TAM), this study aimed to investigate the acceptability of video game technologies (serious games) for medical emergency procedure and decision making training. Using the Triage Trainer, a prototype serious game for the triage sieve process, differences between gamers and non-gamers, males and females, and the effects of ratings of computer self efficacy (i.e. computer skill and gaming skill) and attitudes towards computers (i.e. enthusiasm and anxiety) on the acceptance model were also investigated. The results show significant correlations for computer self-efficacy and attitude variables with the perceived ease of use (PEOU), perceived usefulness (PU) and attitudes towards use (ATU) of the game. Multiple regression showed that 52% of the variance in ATU was explained by the PU and PEOU. However, none of the secondary variables (self efficacy or emotions) had a significant effect on the ATU, PU and PEOU over and above each other.

Revisiting the Satisfaction-Loyalty Relationship in the Sport Video Gaming Context: The Mediating Role of Consumer Expertise

The current study revisited the satisfaction-loyalty paradigm in a hedonic consumption context that involves a learning component. In particular, this study involved actual users (N = 328) of a specific sport video game (FIFA soccer), to examine the structural relationships among the constructs of: game satisfaction, hedonic attitudes toward the brand, gaming skill, and brand loyalty. Contrary to existing research in this area, SEM results indicated that customer satisfaction did not have a direct effect on loyalty. The relationship between game satisfaction and loyalty was mediated by positive brand attitudes and perceived gaming skill. The applied and theoretical implications of the findings are discussed along with limitations and future directions for research.