WWW2013 Paper Authors: Jing-Kai Lou, Kunwoo Park, Meeyoung Cha, Juyong Park, Chin-Laung Lei, and Kuan-Ta Chen Download the full paper PDF at http://mia.kaist.ac.kr/publication/www2013_park.pdf Modern Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs) provide lifelike virtual environments in which players can conduct a variety of activities including combat, trade, and chat with other players. While the game world and the available actions therein are inspired by their offline counterparts, the games’ popularity and dedicated fan base are testament to the allure of novel social interactions granted to people by granting them an alternative life as new characters and personae. In this paper we investigate the phenomenon of “gender swapping,” which refers to players choosing avatars of genders opposite to their natural ones. We report the behavioral patterns observed in players of Fairyland Online, a globally serviced MMORPG, during social interactions when playing as in-game avatars of their own real gender or genderswapped, and discuss the effect of gender role and self-image in virtual social situations and the potential of our study for improving MMORPG qualities and detection of fake online identities.

1. Gender Swapping and User Behaviors
in Online Social Games
Jing-Kai Lou, Kunwoo Park, Meeyoung Cha,
Juyong Park, Chin-Laung Lei, Kuan-Ta Chen
In proc. of the 22nd International Conference on WWW 2013

2. 2
Online game as a research platform
• Games provide lifelike virtual environments
– Social relationships: friends, guilds
– Chat
– Battles
– Trades
• Research opportunities
– Human mobility patterns [La and Michiardi, WOSN 2008]
– Understand the structure [Son et al., PLoS One 2012]
– Verify social theories [Szell and Thurner, Scientific Report 2013]

3. 3
Gender is a strong social stimulus
• Ego’s view of alters depends heavily on their genders
[Credit: Final Fantasy XIII-3]

4. 4
Research on gender roles
• Gender swapping is widespread
– Swapping first observed in MUD[Bruckman, Proc. Of Internet Society 1993]
– Two thirds of players do [Cole and Griffiths, Cyber Psychology & Behavior 2007]
• Gender roles
– Males play for a longer period of time and achieve higher
levels, while females play games to meet people
[Yee, MIT Press Journals 2006]
– Males are achievers and females are socializers
[Bartle, J. of Vir. Env. 1996]
– Homosexual players are likelier to swap genders
[Huh and Williams, Springer 2010]
Existing research on human behaviors has
relied on one-time self-reported data

5. 5
Gender swapping
• Users can choose to play with avatars of their opposite gender
• Notation: Player-Gender.Avatar-Gender
4 types (M.M, M.F, F.M, F.F) for a given user
16 types for a given pair of users
M.F
Gender-swapped
M.M
Straight

6. Gender swapping Game data Our findings
[Credit: Little Big Planet]

7. 7
Fairyland data
• Provided by the Lager Technology in Taiwan
• 4538 players and 17610 avatars in 2003
• player profiles (offline) – age, gender, zipcode
• avatar info (online) – avatar gender, friends list, activity

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Correlation with geography
• Q: Are urbanites more likely to swap genders?
• A: No
Gender ratio was nearly consistent
in rural and urban areas (p=0.5697)

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Correlation with player gender
• Q: Are male (or female) players more likely to swap genders?
• A: Yes, females (45%) do so more than males (37%)
Both male and female players owned similar numbers of avatars (p=0.1131)
but females were more likely to swap genders (p = 6.2228e-08)

10. 10
Correlation with player maturity
• Q: Are older players more
likely to swap genders?
What about players with
many avatars?
• A: Yes to both Qs.
Experienced users may
know the benefits of
gender-swapping!

11. What are the potential benefits of gender swapping?

12. 12
Impact on level-ups
• Q: Do gender swappers achieve a higher level more quickly?
– Leveling up takes an increasing amount of time as levels rise
– Male players level up more quickly than female players
– Players achieve a higher level more quickly with male avatars
Level-ups clearly show that players follow the
gender role theory that males are achievers

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Impact on chat frequency
• Q: Who sends messages to whom?
– The odds ratio against random expectations
– Players are likely to send messages to opposite-gender avatars
– The trend is reversed in friendship formation
Males like to talk to those who dress up as females!
(and vice versa)

14. 14
Impact on chat length
• Q: Do players chat longer when gender-swapped?
– Female players chat longer than male players (similar to phone calls)
– Chats are longer between opposite-gender avatarsChat activity also follows the gender role theory

15. 15
Chat example
I am gender-
swapped! 

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Impact on economic activity
• Q: Do gender-swappers get a better deal?
– Market price of the five most traded items and their expected gains
Female avatars tend to profit more in trades

17. 17
Trade example
$12 $10 $15 $13Selling price
I am gender-
swapped! 

18. Gender swapping Game data Our findings

19. 19
Potential applications
• Gender roles and identities are associated with the choice of avatars
• Bot detection: use gender-related features to boost accuracy
• Online identity fraud detection: find sexual deviants or predators

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Summary
• Gender swapping is prevalent in online games
→ May indicate potential benefits
• Although chats occur more frequently between opposite-gender
avatars, friendships form between the same-gender players
→ Alternative identity does not completely mask the real persona
• Female players act more achievement-oriented when gender
swapped, while female avatars profit more in trades
→ Gamers' actions depend on their identity in games

21. OBRIGADA
21

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Game characteristics
• Gender ratio: 40% of the players were female (other games: 16-32%)
• Age ratio: 87% of the players were aged between 10-30 (8% over 30)
• Peak hours: 8-9 PM (5AM the lowest)