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Mar 23, 2009 1:27 pm US/Central
'U' Researcher On Team Studying EverQuest
ST. PAUL (AP) ―
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EverQuest II is an online multiplayer role-playing game where players take on roles, form teams and slay monsters. (File)
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A researcher at the University of Minnesota is part of a team of social scientist studying leadership and other characteristics in an unlikely place.
In fact, it's no place at all. It's the virtual fantasy world of EverQuest II, an online multiplayer role-playing game where players take on roles, form teams, slay monsters and go on quests.
University of Minnesota computer science professor Jaideep Srivastava is part of a multi-year, multi-million dollar project funded by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Army.
He said it has the potential to advance social science research in the way that gene sequencing has transformed biology.
Sony Online Entertainment removed the real-life names of the players then provided three years of play data to the researchers from Minnesota, Northwestern University, the University of Illinois and the University of Southern California.
While researcher's don't know the names of the players, they can see how and when they interact. Anonymous surveys of players revealed more socio-demographic characteristics, including gender, age, sexual orientation, psychological profiles and body mass index.
"We know lots about them, except who they are," said Dmitri Williams, an assistant professor at the Annenberg School of Communication at the USC.
Sony provided the data because the company thinks the researchers may help it learn more about its customers and how to keep their business.
The scientists said the Army is funding the project with hopes it may provide insights on effective leadership, or how winning teams are formed in a competitive environment.
"The Army is very interested in getting groups of people to work together effectively," Williams said.
Researchers are working with what they believe is a uniquely large data set, showing group dynamics involving thousands of interactions at a level of detail and accuracy that would be impossible for researchers to record in the physical world.
For example, studying macroeconomics in EverQuest II doesn't rely on surveys and estimates.
"Unlike the real economy, we can measure and track every single transaction to the penny in real time," said Williams. "It is a very powerful tool."
For example, it turns out that the virtual economy acts a lot like the physical one, said Nosh Contractor, a behavioral science professor at Northwestern. A surge of money in the game results in inflationary prices, just like in the real world.
"The real world is not just offline. The real world is both online and offline," Contractor said.
(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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