Reading, Videogames and Interest

• In Event: Massively Multiplayer Online Games, Teenage Guys, and Learning: Experiments in an After-School Game-Based Casual Learning Lab

Abstract

Objectives
Boys consistently underperform in or opt out of literacy-related courses such as English and composition. By the end of high school, one in four boys with college-educated parents reads below basic level, meaning they cannot read a newspaper with understanding (Klienfeld, 2009). One proposed explanation is the “displacement hypothesis,” which assumes, if teenage boys were playing videogames less, they would be reading print text more. However, recent research shows that, for players reading is not an activity replaced by videogames, but rather it is an integral part of it. More than one third of gamers (36%) regularly read game-related texts; These numbers increase dramatically when one considers massively multiplayer online games (MMOs) (Lenhart et al., 2008). This paper reports on a series of four studies designed to investigate the hypothesis that videogames may be a solution to –rather than a cause of – the problem of adolescent boys and reading.
Methods
The goal of this series of four investigations was to (a) identify the digital texts that are used as a regular part of gameplay, (b) evaluate the nature and quality of such texts for reading, (c) compare adolescents’ reading performance on such texts to their performance on school-related texts, and (d) assess these adolescents’ performance on game text when they are allowed to choose the topic of the text. All four studies were conducted using the MMO World of Warcraft (WoW), which accounted for 62.2% of the global market at the time of data collection (Woodcock, 2009) and is popular with adolescents and young adults. In Study 1 we interviewed 25 expert players and 21 novice players (N = 46) about the texts they used as a regular part of their gameplay in order to identify the online literacy networks or constellations of text associated with WoW. In Study 2 we randomly selected 50 pages across the top three resources identified in Study 1 for quantitative assessment, including lexical analysis (Laufer & Nation, 1995) and statistical calculation of the average grade-referenced reading level (Flesch, 1948; Fry, 1968) and qualitative assessment of their structural characteristics, multimodal content, and genre composition. In Study 3, we compared adolescent WoW players’ reading performance and comprehension strategies (Clay, 2002) on game-related and school-related text. Finally, in Study 4 we allowed participants to choose the topic of the game-related text and did not artificially lower its difficulty.
Findings
Results demonstrate that the texts regularly involved in videogame play are primarily expository in nature, with an 11.8-grade reading level and 4% academic vocabulary. Boys’ reading performance was the same on game-related and school-related texts when the topic was assigned. However, when allowed to choose topics, so-called struggling readers performed 6.2 grade levels above their diagnosed competency due to doubled self-correction rates. Thus, game-related reading may be particularly efficacious for readers identified as struggling in school—not because such reading is games-related but because it is interest-driven, fostering persistence in the face of textual challenges among students who might otherwise disengage.

Authors

• Constance Steinkuehler, University of Wisconsin - Madison

• Caroline Cassie-Marie Williams, University of Wisconsin - Madison