“Our analysis suggests that there are some game features that are more appealing to girls than others. These features are related to all aspects of games, including the thematic content and focus, as well the kinds of strategies and computer-playing skills demanded of the players; one particularly important feature appears to be whether the game interfaces with the reality of players’ lives” p65 Cassell J. Jenkins H (Eds) (1998) From Barbie to Mortal Combat: Gender and Computer Games The MIT Press
Introduction
While investigating the validity of the above statement, we discovered that the statement is true. However, it goes a bit deeper than this. It appears as Sheri Graner Ray (2002) put it, a bit of a chicken-egg problem. (Winegarner, Beth 2005) The industry is not creating gaming software that connects to the female players’ lives, so females do not buy games. Because females do not buy games, the industry is not making software that connects with their lives. Not only is there little to attract girls to computer and console games, but there are specific design features that will actively push them away. In addition to this, game publishers do not recognize the value of this market, because they do not see the need. As it turns out, there is even more reason to attract girls to gaming beyond the profit motive. There is now evidence that gaming changes the architecture of the brain and enhances visual-spatial ability. Educationally we are shooting ourselves in the proverbial foot by ignoring this.
Sherry Turkle writes, “the computer culture has become linked to a characteristically masculine worldview, such that women too often feel they need to choose between the cultural associations of ‘femininity’ and those of ‘computers’” (AAUW, 2000, p. 7) When children are very young, boys seem to have an edge in manual dexterity and speed. However, girls edge them out in communications and reasoning skills. When it begins to even out in about sixth grade, the culture has already made its mark and this is emphasized. Girls are discouraged from pursuing math and science, if not overtly by the teacher, covertly by their interest in boys, who do not admire smart girls or girls that can beat them. So even girls who naturally gravitate to the computer will back off. Laurel argues that mastering a game is a “social plus” for boys, while for girls it is a “social taboo” (Bjork et al 2004).
(Chu et al 2004)This attitude is reinforced in many schools by locating the computers in the math and science areas, and even when the computers are located in a gender-neutral area, the guys will crowd out the girls physically, violating their private space to dominate the machine. Males see the machines as something to conquer, while females prefer to interact cooperatively. community groups can develop a greater variety of programs in terms of content, delivery, and timeframe. Individual mentoring and coaching also provide teenage girls with positive role models of technology use (Hull & Schultz, 2002; O’Dell, 2002; Ramnanan, 2001). So they see the computer as different from the start, in addition, girls are given productive software, while their brothers get games, and they often have inferior machines passed on by the males in the family when they upgrade, so they never have the same capability as the males as if it is not worth giving them good equipment.
So how are games gendered and what makes them so masculine?
The content and visual appeal are very easy to see. Girls are not amused by blood and gore, so the ability to tone this down will stop some of the mad rushes away from these kinds of games. Girls are also not very amused by playing with female figures with exaggerated bosoms and butts, and another sexual innuendo. The gaming industry should remember that you do not insult your prospective customer.
Beyond this, most games are goal-based, and the punishment for missing is usually a rather brutal death and starting over. By including a component of activity-based content, even if it points to an eventual goal, female players would be more interested in playing. Dumping girls back to start over makes them frustrated. Female players prefer some way to perfect their play by trying again on the same level. Vampire Diaries, published by Her Interactive in 1996 automatically saves the player’s play whenever there is a danger they might die, and then presents them with the choice to view the play and then try again. Females will gravitate to this kind of play since they prefer correcting mistakes to starting over. More than this, many of the macho games have hidden moves that are not intuitive. This addresses the male habit of touching and experimenting. The moves are not documented where anyone could learn them, so when girls play against guys, they usually lose, not from lack of skill, but because they don’t “fool around: with the buttons, so they do not know all the capabilities. In addition, many first-person shooters have only limited actions available, and you do them over and over again, which female players tire of quickly. More variety will attract female players as will a puzzle element.
The storyline is another area of difference. How females are depicted in the game matters. How they look and what they can do. In early games, the females were merely damsels in distress, as in Mario and Donkey Kong. Despite this girls played, because they were not repulsed by ridiculously sexualized avatars. The girls were cute and they have just seen an electronic doll.
Guys favor one on one competition, while gals prefer team-based. Witness the success of some of the online games which require teamwork, such as Bounty Bay and World of Warcraft. The is plenty of opportunity in these games for a single one-on-one competition, but the high achievement of domination over territory requires teamwork. These games have been attracting more female players than the single user one on one type games. Women refer to a mix of direct and indirect competition, and become bored by a steady diet of one on one, while men would play on with the only direct competition. One last difference is the story. Guys will play with no story element, while girls find this boring, so a storyline is essential if the game is to attract female players. This is because males will react emotionally and with heightened adrenaline to visual cues, like spraying blood and lots of action. Females simply do not have the same physiological response to visual stimuli, but they do react to the story. Look at the highly popular game Myst by Rand and Robyn Miller, which had a much higher percentage of female players than the average game. It is the emotional attachment to characters that drives the female player.
One more element which is very attractive to female players is the ability to design their own space, avatars, and even the gameplay. Online games are well suited to this, as they are highly flexible and can easily evolve since they are not tied to a CD or cartridge. The social element of online gaming is also attractive to girls. In young children to adolescents, “Video and computer games are mainly connected to peer relations, while parents or other adults only participate in the margins. This seems to be true for boys as well as for girls, but boys, on average, play more frequently (alone as well as with others) and show a greater interest in games and related issues.” (Fromme, Johannes, 2008) Girls like to discuss the story and what happens. Multiplayer online games are more attractive also for the group play and team aspect, as mentioned earlier.
So why do we want to make games that attract female players?
Money
More than half the world is female. This is a significant market. Game companies can double their revenue. These companies envision a constantly growing market, but they are ignoring half of it. Of course, all the peripheral suppliers and marketers will suffer too, As a whole, this could also add to the economic growth of whatever country gets there first, and that is worth doing.
Education Skills
Williamson (2006) sees games, especially role-playing games as a way to promote innovation even at the primary school level. Educators agree that when students are engaged or having fun, they learn more. So games adapted to education are worth developing. However, if we do not design them with the girls in mind also, we will be leaving half of our children behind. Gee (2003) tells us that games that are designed well for learning will be played and will sell well. However, games that are designed poorly for learning will not be played and will not sell. So, very educational games will make money, and money-making, popular games will educate. Do we want to educate only half of our population?
“Technology holds great promise for advancing science education. However, there exists a troubling computer game culture gender gap. In contemporary culture, the computer is no longer an isolated machine: It is a centerpiece of science, the arts, media, industry, commerce, and civic life.” (AAUW, 2000).
One group of university teachers is even using games to teach IT principles, and they considered very carefully before choosing the game because all of the students were female. (Yucel, Zupco and El Nasr 2008) The program was highly successful. Further research showed recently that playing video games can enhance visual-spatial ability.
“We demonstrate a previously unknown gender difference in the distribution of spatial attention, a basic capacity that supports higher-level spatial cognition. More remarkably, we found that playing an action video game can virtually eliminate this gender difference in spatial attention and simultaneously decrease the gender disparity in mental rotation ability, a higher-level process in spatial cognition.” (Feng, Spence, and Pratt 2007)
Their study at the University of Toronto found that video game playing can virtually eliminate the known disparity between males and females and also decrease the gender disparity in mental rotation at the same time. Mental rotation is the ability to look at an object, or a group of objects and extrapolate what the other side looks like. This is an ability that is closely linked to higher mathematical functioning. “Boys have always played different games than girls, and early recreational activities have often been cited as a major cause of gender differences in adult spatial cognition.” (e.g.Baenninger&Newcombe, 1989). It was found in this study that playing action video games can greatly enhance performance in all visual-spatial tasks. However, interestingly, there was considerably more improvement for females than for males, which hints that this practice is tapping into lesser-used areas of the brain in females.
“Spatial abilities—including mental rotation ability—have been associated with success in mathematics and science courses (Delgado & Prieto, 2004), performance on standardized tests (e.g., the SAT; Casey, Nuttall, Pezaris, & Benbow, 1995), and the choice of mathematics and science as majors in college “(Casey et al., 1995).
With this information, we can see that designing video and computer games that will attract female players will have long-term consequences in education. If playing action games develops an area in which many females have a deficit versus males, addressing that deficit is a critical step toward acquiring more mathematicians and scientists.
Conclusions
Therefore, designing video games for girls or ones which will attract, or at least not repel, female players will have several long-lasting effects on the economy and in education. Undoubtedly, it will also impact our culture, since it is clear that it is already doing so. It is probably prudent to include females here also. The major elements of design need to be addressed to attract female players. These include the elements within the game, such as object and play content, story, characters, avatars, method of play, and visual elements. Most important are to incorporate story, eliminate repetitive action and add an element of activity or puzzle to the game.
Beyond this, we must also address the chicken-egg problem and change the way female children see computers. If girls are given equal access to equally good equipment and the computer is presented as entertainment, they will begin to see it in a more positive light. Then if games are available which are attractive to girls, they will play them. The gender difference will then be addressed.
Finally, we will see more girls becoming interested in mathematics and science as their abilities even out with the males. Education and our culture will benefit. Of course, all of this will enhance our economy as we open up the other half of the computer and video game market.
References
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Bjork, Staffan, Holopainen, Jussi, 2004, Patterns in Game Design, Charles River Media.
Casey, M.B., Nuttall, R., Pezaris, E., & Benbow, C.P. (1995). The influence of spatial ability on gender differences in mathematics college entrance test scores across diverse samples. Developmental Psychology, 31, 697–705.
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