Gendered Constraints to Participation in Online Gaming Communities

• In Event: 63.084 - Roundtable Session 22
  In Roundtable Session: 63.084-12 - Roundtable Session: The Many Facets of Video Game Communities, Design, and Discourses

Abstract

Many previous studies of gender in gaming have focused on individual-level mechanisms for women’s participation (i.e., what is it about women that precludes them from playing). Scholarship either refuses to consider gender at all or renders it an insignificant variable (Jensen & de Castell, 2010). But less attention has been paid to the culture of game communities and the constraints that exist for women to participate. We will build on this second body of literature by using an analytical frame that focuses on the conditions of gaming environments that may spur unequal participation by analyzing conditions in three online communities. We also describe the learning constraints and impacts that this has on women in these communities.

Authors

• Crystle Martin, University of California - Irvine

• Matthew Rafalow, University of California - Irvine