The Effects of Gender, Age, and Experience on Game Engagement. (September 2013)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Procci, Katelyn; James, Nicholas; Bowers, Clint
• Is Part Of: Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society ... Annual Meeting. Volume 57:Part 1(2013)
• Page Start: 2132
• Page End: 2136
• Publication Date: 2013-09
• Subjects: Human engineering -- Congresses; 620.8205
• DOI: 10.1177/1541931213571475
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1541-9312

Abstract

Entertainment gaming research typically focuses on the underlying motivations for play and on the subjective experience. A review of the literature has identified three factors that commonly affect patterns of play: gender, age, and gaming experience. This paper examines whether these individual differences affect the subjective experience of play, as measured by game engagement. Participants played a browserbased Flash game and responded to a number of surveys. The results suggested that low-levels of game engagement predict high-levels of game engagement, providing support for a proposed model of game engagement that exists on a gradient. The ability to experience low-levels of engagement while playing games is not affected by the individual differences of interest; however high-level engagement did decrease with age. Age may also weaken the relationship between low- and high-level game engagement.