user research

what's the deal with airline fo—I mean, gender?

I enjoy media criticism and I enjoy learning about the ways gender and games can potentially intersect. In graduate school, I undertook two research projects that dealt with gender and games, one a broad overview of the topic with citations deliberately restricted to the prior few years and the other taking a more focused and intimate look at fans of World of Warcraft using an ethnographic approach.

I would like to note, front and center, that these particular papers were written a while ago and use more "binary" gendered terms in the titles (and in some parts of the texts) than I would use today. My natural inclination toward being pithy and using dumb puns is, as always, the source of my personal downfall. Gender is not a binary, and the arguments and conclusions within those papers often apply to all underrepresented genders within the game industry and broader game community! I have (hopefully) made amendments to all of the direct quotes from the original papers.

Gender & Games

Women & WoW

Screenshot of the document pages for the paper

It's Not as Simple as "Boys Will Be Boys"

Understanding the Impact of Gender in Games, Game Communities, and the Game Industry (2013)

I wrote a paper which summarized and contextualized then-current issues relating to the intersection of gender and games, game communities, and the game industry. It was intended to be snapshot in time, and relied only on fairly recent sources. A subsection of the resulting paper was accepted by the Digital Games Research Association (DiGRA) for publication and presentation, though I was unfortunately unable to attend the conference.

Gender an Games

"To fully examine games as gendered spaces, it must be understood that games do not end at the borders of their virtual worlds, or once their narrative conclusion has been reached—they travel on to other digital spaces, through social networking sites, forums, fansites, and other online gathering places. It is necessary to examine not only how gender is handled by game developers, but also how games are played by people of different genders, how gender is handled in the game community at large, as well as why women* are underrepresented as game creators and the consequences of that underrepresentation."

* and people who identify with other genders that are also "non-dominant" within the game community

so, it's possible that I got a little bit carried away

When I handed this over to my favorite critical studies professor for his comments, he made this sort of half-pleased-half-long-suffering face, because by that point he was extremely used my particular brand of nonsense. (Thank you, Professor Huber, for always putting up with me.)

It's 33 pages long, single-spaced, clocking in at a ridiculous 15,000 words. Oops?

(If anyone is interested, contact me and I'll be happy to send you the entire, comically-oversized document.)

things that were good about this project

Wide-ranging and fairly comprehensive, it was a solid summary of many major issues across the broad including:
- The portrayal of women within games
- The continual erasure of non-male members of the geek or game community
- Whether players of different genders play games differently and whether they play different games
- The sometimes extreme backlash against women (or people of other under-represented genders) who play games or who critique them
- The relative lack of women (and people of other under-represented genders) within the industry
Focused on contemporary issues using contemporary sources: aside from one passing reference to a book from 1998—my obligatory Henry Jenkins shout-out—all works cited were from 2009 or later, with the vast majority being from the prior year (2012).
It was kind of a project that meant a lot to me personally, and which let me place a lot of issues I had encountered myself into a larger framework
My final draft had 28 footnotes, and that brought me a lot of joy as a habitual pedant of the worst kind
- There may have been a citation to one "Stephen T. Colbert, DFA"
- I got to use one of them (again, it bears restating, in an academic paper which was later accepted for publication), to define the meaning of the acronym "GTFO"

things that weren't so great

The obvious issue is that it was way too long and the scope was far too large; "overambitious" would be the polite way to say it, but "hubristic" is also probably fair
It would have worked a lot better as a series of essays each fully exploring a topic, rather than dipping a toe into many different topics and winding up with an absolute behemoth of a paper despite that relative superficiality
In the same way that it was timely when I wrote it, it is now unfortunately a product of its time
- Congrats to me for writing a giant paper on "gender in games" and submitting it for publication approximately 5 minutes before Gamergate started and everything really went to hell
- Even aside from that, which obviously represented a huge and tremendously important (slash-gutwrenchingly-demoralizing) shift in the politics involved, the whole intentional focus on sources from that time period means it hasn't aged super well—there are new sources now, new issues at the forefront, so it's simply not "current enough" anymore
A fair amount of it is a little simple, a little juvenile—my whole social justice ethos or whatever hadn't really had enough time to cook yet, so some of my arguments ended up a little under-baked (see, for example, the very obvious binary-esque language)
I'm not really sure what my goal was, beyond writing up a long list of gross stuff, angrily pointing at it, and shouting "this sucks!" with steam coming out of my ears
- I did not, as it turns out, single-handedly end sexism in 33 pages or less
- That gross stuff sure does suck, but I didn't offer up a whole lot in the way of suggestions for how to improve things beyond "uhhh maybe stop doing the gross stuff, ugh"
- It's fair to be upset about weird discrimination and vitriol poisoning something you care about, but I would expect something more from myself in terms of analysis now, seven (very long) years later

"There are substantial challenges which need to be surmounted in order for these spaces to become inclusive and safe. However, the situation is far from hopeless. There are already steps being taken to work toward more comfortable game spaces."

A screenshot of my warlock from World of Warcraft

Playing Like a Girl: An examination of how and why women play "World of Warcraft" (2014)

Women and WoW

I, a veteran "World of Warcraft" player and therefore totally bona fide participant observer, used a small-scale, ethnographic approach when structuring this study. The majority of the findings came from in-depth player interviews focused on how player gender interacted with the representation of gender in the game, and how player gender might (or might not!) impact playstyle.

"There is a popularly held belief that women* play games differently (and perhaps more 'casually'), though there has been little formal data to support or disprove this hypothesis. The goal of this study is to understand the context behind the playstyles of several Warcraft-playing women and compare and contrast that real-world context with presumptions about how and why women* play."

* (and often players who identify with other genders underrepresented within the game community)

academic context

This study was attacked from two angles and thus got a doubly whammy of feedback from both a user research perspective (courtesy of Dennis Wixon, an industry professional and one of my professors at USC) and from a fan studies/participatory culture angle (courtesy of the Henry Jenkins after I managed to finagle my way into one of his doctoral courses at USC, a great personal accomplishment I have yet to shut up about).

That is partly why, though they were quite different in structure, I would consider this to be a more successful research effort than my previous project.

study design and methodology

recruitment

I drew from the World of Warcraft Twitter community in order to find participants for this study.

It is worth noting that the segment of Twitter I was most familiar with, and therefore the segment most likely to respond to my call for participants, tended to be socially and politically feminist. My attempts to diversify my potential audience while seeking participants were questionably successful.

interview questions

Subjects were interviewed individually and asked three main questions, with follow up questions as applicable:

Can you describe for me a typical session of play in World of Warcraft?
How did you first start playing World of Warcraft?
How do you perceive player gender in-game?

The participants were also asked for basic information on their demographics and relative familiarity with the game.

purpose and goals

There are pervasive stereotypes within the gaming (and the World of Warcraft) community with regard to women* who play, and certain ways of playing are gendered as either "masculine" or "feminine," with masculine play often being privileged. As an example, "healing" (a non-offensive, support role) within the game is seen as feminine, while "tanking" (being the protector of a group of players) is seen as masculine. There is also the tendency within the community to downplay the dedication and skill of women* who play, or even to deny their existence as a demographic altogether.

The goal of this study was to understand the context behind the playstyles of several Warcraft-playing women and compare and contrast that real-world data with presumptions about how and why women* play.

* (While all participants in this study identified as women, many of these assumptions also apply to people of other genders who are underrepresented in the community.)

subjects

Four subjects:

Nico, age 31
Jane, age 49
Tzufit, age 29
Deborah, age 51

All participants were white, at least college educated, and employed. All had been playing World of Warcraft for between six and ten years.

These players' experiences with World of Warcraft, their age range, and their education level are at odds with popular stereotypes of Warcraft-playing women, and those of Warcraft players in general.

playstyle observations

while none of the subjects played World of Warcraft in quite the same way, there were many overlapping motivations and preferences

All participants stated an enjoyment for experimenting with and leveling other characters and classes (“alt” characters) in addition to their “main” character.
Most participants play damage-dealing characters (DPS), and at least two also play healing or tanking characters. There is no in-game role all four universally prefer.
All have raided before, and some raid currently.
- Raiding is the highest level of end-game player-versus-environment play and it requires considerable skill, teamwork, and experience.
Most participants enjoy some of the more “casual” aspects of the game in addition to high-level play: collecting or leveling battle pets, creating “transmogrification” cosmetic gear sets, farming, roleplaying, or collecting in-game achievements.
Jane and Deborah both mentioned story development and a robust virtual world as being strong motivators for playing World of Warcraft, and the other subjects also seemed interested in the “lore” aspects of the game.
All participants currently play with a significant other, but the majority were not introduced to the game by a significant other.
- Two, Nico and Tzufit, met their significant others through Warcraft specifically.
World of Warcraft is a social game, and all participants mentioned several social motivations for playing.
- Many mentioned friends, both real-life and online, and guildmates as their primary motivation to continue playing the game.
- Nico stated unequivocally, “If I didn’t play with my guild I would probably quit. I would have quit a long time ago,” a sentiment which was echoed by the other women interviewed.
- That said, not all play “with” others synchronously. Several mentioned talking to friends or family as playing “with” others, even though their characters were not performing the same virtual activity.

in terms of gender

a lot of participant behaviors and thoughts about gender also overlapped

Some of the participants hide, or do not actively provide, their gender in-game. Only one, Nico, stated that she would correct someone in-game for using the incorrect pronouns.
- It was almost universally acknowledged that speaking up on gender issues caused others in-game to automatically assume they were women.
All four participants, regardless of how others gendered them in-game, gendered other players based on the gender of the character, unless provided with additional information.
Half of the players mentioned specifically avoiding playing with strangers so that they wouldn’t receive gender-based grief, and a few stated that they never played with people they didn’t already know.
All of the participants seemed to believe that gender politics apply in the game as much as they do outside of it.
- There was an inherent understanding that their gender impacted their play and how they were perceived.
- All made reference to certain ways of playing being gendered as "masculine" or "feminine."

Nico provided an excellent summary of the disconnect between the gendered expectation of playstyle preference versus the reality:

"I feel that women get pushed into those sorts of roles [healing] in gaming a lot because it reinforces societal roles that women feel predisposed toward, because they’re told that that’s what they’re like. But women tank, women DPS, women play at the highest levels of the game, women play casually, women play PvP [player-versus-player content], women play everything."

Nico, study participant

an unexpected point of contention

None of the study results thus far had particularly shocked me, as someone who has had experiences with World of Warcraft very similar to those of the participants. I chose the questions I asked very intentionally, so I had some expectations about what topics might come up over the course of the interviews; it was therefore pretty surprising to me when all of the participants brought up an issue I had not asked about at all.

Every one of these women proactively expressed frustration over the direction and advertising of the game and their perceived status as part of the intended audience for the game.

Context is important here, I think: these interviews were conducted relatively soon after the announcement of the "Warlords of Draenor" expansion at that year's Blizzcon, an announcement which was somewhat controversial, at least in the circles I ran in. The promotional imagery and copy used was, for lack of a better word, very specifically "masculine."

(I personally remember being in the audience for the announcement, all smushed together with my guildmates in front of the stage and waiting with bated breath to hear what cool stuff we'd get to do next, and hearing the presenter slip up and call our characters traveling to Draenor a "boys' trip." It didn't feel... great.)

The issue was not one of aesthetics, but rather of perceived trends in the design of the game, including specific story developments, the lack of female characters, and the increasingly "hypermasculine" marketing of the game. The unifying theme was that none of these women felt recognized as the dedicated and loyal fans they were, and instead felt that they were being deliberately dismissed as part of the (actually pretty diverse) audience for the game.

I think Tzufit expressed that discomfort particularly well:

"I feel very done [with the game], and it’s not about my guild, it’s not about the people I play with, it’s not really about the gameplay, it’s all about the presentation. And that’s bizarre for me, because that’s not the priority, but at some point I just feel like every message I’m getting is, 'This game is not for you.'"

Tzufit, study participant

I do think a lot of that frustration was exacerbated by the specific time period during which the interviews were held, but I also don't think those concerns were entirely unwarranted or unreasonable, especially coming from people who have played the game so consistently and for so long.

I don't think it's an issue of entitlement, I think it's an issue of wanting to feel welcome loving the things you love.

To me, it really drives home the impact that marketing can have, and why the decision to be mindful and inclusive when speaking to your audience can be vitally important. While not a "positive" finding, necessarily, it was unanticipated and, I think, significant. (I also think that, in the subsequent years and expansions, the issue has improved in some ways, which I'm thankful for as a long-time player myself.)

taking a step back and looking at the results as a whole, what are the takeaways?

When comparing these findings with the accepted 'knowledge' about the demographic for World of Warcraft, several discrepancies stand out.

First, these women unequivocally play the game and do so at the highest levels, not just on a “casual” level.

Second, that the population of women who play may have a much larger age range than previously believed, though a presumption of youth is a common misconception which is applied to gamers of all genders.

Third, that these women do not all prefer the same in-game role; most mentioned DPS characters more than healers, despite the latter being seen as the most 'feminine' role. In fact, it would be impossible to state an overall role preference for these subjects as they all enjoy experimenting extensively with different classes and roles, not just those gendered as feminine.

My final conclusion, then, is that these women play intensely, well, and often, which contradicts the common perception of who plays World of Warcraft (and also, perhaps, Blizzard’s own understanding of their fan demographic).