Video Game Used

In multiplayer first-person shooters like Halo 3, teams cooperate to kill members of the opposing team outside of a dedicated storyline such as that seen in a single player campaign within the game. As a result, the multiplayer games can be argued to be direct competitions outside of any sexualized storyline or content as they are only associated with the goal of eliminating opponents. Killing opponents results in a positive outcome for the team, while dying results in a negative outcome. In addition, improved performance within a game allows players to attain higher ranks and improve their skill rating, a long-term measurement of player status (i.e. dominance) that is publicly exhibited. We examine how individuals behave toward a male or female-voiced teammate as a function of positive (number of kills) and negative (number of deaths) player performance, as well as player status (maximum skill achieved).

A secondary benefit of using Halo 3 is that players are covered head-to-toe with armor and identified by armor color, rather than facial features or body type. Additionally, player controlled avatars are not the hypersexualized males normally seen in many other video games, hopefully decreasing the overt sexism seen in most online competitive games and minimizing the effect of the game environment.

The only game the study played is Halo 3

Results

We played a total of 163 games of Halo 3 in the two manipulations. We stopped at 163 as this is a substantial time effort. Data could not be analyzed during the experiment as the transcripts needed to be transcribed. Of the 163 games, 82 were in the female manipulation and 81were in the male manipulation and players only spoke within 102 of the games. A total of 189 players spoke in these 102 games; all of them were male. This is not to say that women did not play, just that they did not speak. This does, however, reinforce the fact that women are entering a very male dominated environment. Of these individuals, 147 individuals were teammates of the experimental player and 42 individuals were opponents. For our analyses, we focused on teammates as these individuals interact with the experimental player for the duration of the game. Opponents, in contrast, only interacted with the experimental player for a short period (less than 3 minutes) in the lobby after the game. Of the 147 teammates, 82 individuals were in the female manipulation and 65 were in the male manipulation. The range of players that spoke within an individual game varied from 1–3. To test whether the ‘Game’ affected the statement type and number, we added game as a random variable in our initial analyses. As ‘Game’ did not explain any of the variation in the type and number of statements made, it was removed from further analyses.

They played a total of 163 games of Halo 3. And got 189 actually speaking players.

I'm not good at statistics or anything, but I doubt that 189 people playing a console exclusive fps from 2007 are enough to make a statement about the entire spectrum of gamers.

(Also wasn't Halo mainly played by teenagers IIRC? I wonder if the reaction towards women was partly caused by hormones and sexual frustration.)