Thesis Proposal

To read my Thesis, click here

From Play to Progress: How Digital Citizenship is Created in Massively 
Multi-player Online Games

Digital citizenship is an increasingly important topic that is lacking in discussion in the education system of today. There is an idea that the “digital natives” (Prensky, 2001) who have grown up around new media technologies like cell phones, lap tops, iPads, and the Internet have an innate understanding of how to navigate and comprehend the virtual world with ease. In reality, they tend to be a generation with access to digital tools and living in a world drenched in change. They do not have the guidance that comes with family members who have been-there-before. Prensky (2001) remarks that “Digital immigrants”, those that remember the days of written letters rather than emails or using white out instead of editing in a word document, are instructors “…who speak an outdated language (that of the pre-digital age), [and] are struggling to teach a population that speaks an entirely new language” (p. 2). In the world of online gaming people are embarking on a new frontier where rules and law are malleable, not tied down to any one state or country since the online environment is accessible to the world at large. Within a virtual world, citizenship is a concept in which the roles and responsibilities individuals take are often constructed by participants within that online society, a society barley out of its infancy.

Video games are an important medium to examine, seeing as how 60% of youth spend on average nearly two hours a day playing them (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). This is a significant amount of time that teenagers dedicate to an entertainment activity. Video games offer a new world of digital literacy, according to David Buckingham (2008) who acknowledges that they are inherently multi-literate activities that involve “… interpreting complex three-dimensional visual environments, reading both on screen and off screen texts (such as games’ magazines, and websites), and processing auditory information” (p. 17). Steinkuehler’s (2006) linguistic research on how textual interactions in chat can speak volumes to a player’s ability to convey their knowledge of the game he or she plays validates Buckingham’s assessment of multiple literacies being available and important to the game environment. MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online games) make multiple literacies accessible through social interaction, quest instructions, and fan websites. It is important to interview and examine the participants in a gaming environment to see if, and how, these sources of information are contributing to players conceptions of digital citizenship in the virtual world. Implications of the findings might be applicable to more formal learning environment. The knowledge of how groups construct and govern themselves online in an environment that is based on play with a heavy emphasis on social interaction could contribute to a greater understanding of group creation and work processes in the classroom.

Myself, guild mates, and other players of Guild Wars 2 chatting and hanging out as we wait to participate in a world event

The study I will conduct within Guild Wars 2 will attempt to fill a gap in the research by addressing the following questions in regards to digital citizenship and its role in the aforementioned game:

- How do the participants of the massively multi-player online game (MMORPG) Guild Wars 2 define and enact digital citizenship?
- Why, if at all, do participants find rules and/or codes of conduct within their guild in Guild Wars 2 necessary and/or important?
-What tensions and/or contradictions emerge within Guild Wars 2 as related to digital citizenship?

Why the video game Guild Wars 2?

The opening of the Sylvari's, the woodland creature's, character story in Guild Wars 2

I have chosen a MMORPG to focus this study on because it offers a virtual world through which to explore
the boundaries of citizenship. In this genre of video game the role of the leader is chosen by a group, not a designated individual that the game developers choose. Participants can feel empowered to take charge and make choices in these spaces, feeling on par with someone much older or younger than they are. The space lends itself to malleable group rule making, offering an opportunity to inquire about what each participant views as appropriate or inappropriate behavioral or value based expectations regarding digital citizenship. It is the process of making these decisions and ethical choices that offer an opportunity for research to be conducted in discovery of what digital citizenship may consist of.

In Guild Wars 2 you choose your path from the beginning, making moral and ethical choices the minute you create a character

Methods

One of the characters I will play while being a participant-observer 

To collect data I will be conducting an in-game field study with ethnographic methods to obtain information from 5 participant players within the guild. Qualitative data will be collected through unstructured interviews with guild members via in-game chat or through voice-chat software, through fieldnotes gathered in my experience as a participant-observer, and through artifacts of in-game screen shots, chat logs, video recording of game play, and forum posts which consist of both written and image based conversation. The collection of this variety of research will allow me to gain a broader perspective of what digital citizenship means within the game, and how, if at all, the way guild members function in a variety of spaces alters their views of digital citizenship.

Resources located in the Thesis Proposal linked at the top of the page
First image on this page borrowed from this website
Prezi for GS01 here