TY - JOUR
T1 - When the ball stops, the fun stops too
T2 - The impact of social inclusion on video game enjoyment
AU - Bowman, Nicholas David
AU - Kowert, Rachel
AU - Cohen, Elizabeth
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd.
PY - 2015/7/11
Y1 - 2015/7/11
N2 - Abstract Video games have long been understood as an entertaining and popular medium, and recent work has suggested that at least part of their appeal rests in their ability to foster feelings of sociability and belonging with others. From this, we expected that following an episode of social ostracism, playing video games with other people would be an enjoyable experience due the game's ability to restore one's social needs. However, in a 2 (social inclusion vs. social ostracism) × 2 (choosing to play alone vs. co-playing) quasi-experimental design, individuals who were socially ostracized in a ball tossing game reported no deficit in their subsequent enjoyment of the video game. Ostracized players reported above-average enjoyment, while individuals who were socially included pre-gameplay reported significantly lower enjoyment when playing alone compare to all other conditions. These effects held, controlling for individual sex, trait need for belonging, video game self-efficacy, and individual performance at the game. These results ran counter to predictions regarding the socially restorative power of video games following a social ostracism episode, and offer insight into how social scenarios might foster expectations of entertainment media products.
AB - Abstract Video games have long been understood as an entertaining and popular medium, and recent work has suggested that at least part of their appeal rests in their ability to foster feelings of sociability and belonging with others. From this, we expected that following an episode of social ostracism, playing video games with other people would be an enjoyable experience due the game's ability to restore one's social needs. However, in a 2 (social inclusion vs. social ostracism) × 2 (choosing to play alone vs. co-playing) quasi-experimental design, individuals who were socially ostracized in a ball tossing game reported no deficit in their subsequent enjoyment of the video game. Ostracized players reported above-average enjoyment, while individuals who were socially included pre-gameplay reported significantly lower enjoyment when playing alone compare to all other conditions. These effects held, controlling for individual sex, trait need for belonging, video game self-efficacy, and individual performance at the game. These results ran counter to predictions regarding the socially restorative power of video games following a social ostracism episode, and offer insight into how social scenarios might foster expectations of entertainment media products.
KW - Co-playing
KW - Enjoyment
KW - Need to belong
KW - Ostracism
KW - Video games
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84938513852&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.chb.2015.06.036
DO - 10.1016/j.chb.2015.06.036
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84938513852
SN - 0747-5632
VL - 53
SP - 131
EP - 139
JO - Computers in Human Behavior
JF - Computers in Human Behavior
M1 - 3546
ER -