ABSTRACT

Surveillance is ubiquitous. It is well known that the presence of other people (in-person or remote, actual or perceived) increases performance on simple tasks and decreases performance in complex tasks (Zajonc 1965). But little is known about these phenomena in the context of video games, with recent advances finding that they do not necessarily extend to games (Emmerich and Masuch 2018). In Experiment 1 (N=1489; No Observation vs. Researcher Observing), we find that participants observed by a researcher played significantly longer, and performed significantly better, across three video games. Moreover, we find some support that participants observed by a researcher score higher on player experience and intrinsic motivation. In Experiment 2 (N=843; Researcher Observing vs. Professor Observing), we seek to understand whether different roles differing in their perceived evaluativeness would influence the effects of observation. We find that participants observed by a professor had, at times, significantly lower performance, player experience, intrinsic motivation, playing time, and higher anxiety. In Experiment 3 (N=1358; No Observation vs. Researcher Observing), we further validate Experiment 1 by extending our results to three additional game genres. Here, we provide the largest study on observation in video games to date. The study is also the first to show that observer type can significantly influence player outcomes.

摘要

监控无处不在。众所周知，其他人的存在（亲自或远程，实际或感知）会提高简单任务的表现并降低复杂任务的表现（Zajonc 1965）。但在视频游戏的背景下，人们对这些现象知之甚少，最近的进展发现它们不一定延伸到游戏中（Emmerich 和 Masuch 2018）。在实验 1（N = 1489；无观察与研究人员观察）中，我们发现研究人员观察到的参与者在三个视频游戏中玩的时间明显更长，表现也明显更好。此外，我们发现研究人员观察到的参与者在玩家体验和内在动机方面得分较高的一些支持。在实验 2 ( N=843; 研究人员观察与教授观察），我们试图了解不同角色在感知评价方面的差异是否会影响观察的效果。我们发现，教授观察的参与者有时会显着降低表现、玩家体验、内在动机、游戏时间和更高的焦虑。在实验 3（N = 1358；无观察与研究人员观察）中，我们通过将我们的结果扩展到另外三种游戏类型来进一步验证实验 1。在这里，我们提供了迄今为止最大规模的关于视频游戏观察的研究。该研究也是第一个表明观察者类型可以显着影响玩家结果的研究。