Cyberonic Profile Blog Joined September 2011 Germany 79 Posts Last Edited: 2013-08-26 09:20:17 #1



INTRODUCTION

The study had two main goals. First, to investigate the relationship between playing Starcraft and multitasking abilities. Since I used a flash game and used self-report measures, the methodolgy in this part could potentially skew the results.



Second, and this part was not announced, I anecdotally daily read a lot of complaints from people who play a lot of SC2, especially about balance, of course. I wanted to check whether these qualitative statements had some quantitative foundations. In specific, I investigated whether the amount of playing SC2 has detrimental effects on our general satisfaction with life.



METHODS

In total, 70 participants took part in the study. For investigation of multitask abilities I used the flash game



RESULTS

From the initial 70 participants, 20 had to be excluded from the study. Three because of missing data and 17 due to outlier detection (mostly because they reported several multitask results below 20 seconds whichmeans that they didn't really play). That means, that 50 participants were included in the final analysis.



Multitasking

The longest time reported was 262 seconds. The average of all participants was 70 seconds. I didn't find any connection between "hours of SC2 played" and multitasking ability. Linear models also revealed no interaction with league. Either, playing more doesn't improve one's multitasking abilities or it improves multitasking abilities which are not measured by the Multitask game I used or the results are skewed because I relied on manipulable self-report measures and participants did not report the correct results.





(Looks messy, doesn't it?)



I found a trend (p = .081) that master's players lasted on average 20 seconds longer in the multitasking game compared to the other leagues. They were also better than Grandmaster players but this is most likely due to small sample size of only 3 Grandmaster players in my data set. This is an indication that multitasking abilities such as measured by the Multitask game really help you improve SC2 skill. As expected, age significantly correlates with multitask ability (p = .003; r = -.400). Those in their early 20s were best.



Life Satisfaction

Playing Starcraft correlates negatively with general satisfaction with life (p = .001; r = -.441). The more you play, the less satisfied you are. Don't play so much! To give you an idea, most players in my data set played around 15 hours per week (M = 14.60; SD = 11.9), the minimum was around 1 hour and the maximum was around 40 hours. Also, not surprisingly, the older you get, the less time you invest in SC2 in total (p = .006; r = -.465).



I also asked some questions about playstyle and perceived strengths and weaknesses within Starcraft 2 but I didn't have the time to go over these results yet. If anyone wants to look for him/herself, just write me a pm, I will happily provide you with my SPSS file and/or raw data if you want.



Thank you for reading all of this. If you're interested in anything about this study, feel free to message me or write me an emai to marsaute@gmail.com



You definitely deserve some PIE CHARTS:















Hey again! I want to present some results from my little study I announced here. The study had two main goals. First, to investigate. Since I used a flash game and used self-report measures, the methodolgy in this part could potentially skew the results.Second, and this part was not announced, I anecdotally daily read a lot of complaints from people who play a lot of SC2, especially about balance, of course. I wanted to check whether these qualitative statements had some quantitative foundations. In specific, I investigatedIn total, 70 participants took part in the study. For investigation of multitask abilities I used the flash game Multitask from Kongregrate. The participants played 10 times and entered their results manually into a google form in which I continued the study. Life satisfaction was measured using the widely employed Satisfaction with Life Scale by Ed Diener. After that, participants filled out questions about their playing behavior, most importantly how many hours per week the play, and additionally demographical data.From the initial 70 participants, 20 had to be excluded from the study. Three because of missing data and 17 due to outlier detection (mostly because they reported several multitask results below 20 seconds whichmeans that they didn't really play). That means, that 50 participants were included in the final analysis.The longest time reported was 262 seconds. The average of all participants was 70 seconds.. Linear models also revealed no interaction with league. Either, playing more doesn't improve one's multitasking abilities or it improves multitasking abilities which are not measured by the Multitask game I used or the results are skewed because I relied on manipulable self-report measures and participants did not report the correct results.(Looks messy, doesn't it?)I found a trend (p = .081) thatcompared to the other leagues. They were also better than Grandmaster players but this is most likely due to small sample size of only 3 Grandmaster players in my data set. This is an indication that multitasking abilities such as measured by the Multitask game really help you improve SC2 skill. As expected,(p = .003; r = -.400). Those in their early 20s were best.(p = .001; r = -.441). The more you play, the less satisfied you are. Don't play so much! To give you an idea, most players in my data set played around 15 hours per week (M = 14.60; SD = 11.9), the minimum was around 1 hour and the maximum was around 40 hours. Also, not surprisingly, the older you get, the less time you invest in SC2 in total (p = .006; r = -.465).I also asked some questions about playstyle and perceived strengths and weaknesses within Starcraft 2 but I didn't have the time to go over these results yet. If anyone wants to look for him/herself, just write me a pm, I will happily provide you with my SPSS file and/or raw data if you want.Thank you for reading all of this. If you're interested in anything about this study, feel free to message me or write me an emai to marsaute@gmail.comYou definitely deserve some PIE CHARTS:

TheRabidDeer Profile Blog Joined May 2003 United States 3654 Posts #2 lol'd at gender graph.



So let me get this straight:

Higher league = better at multitasking

However, this isnt relevant to weekly time invested into the game?

Meavis Profile Blog Joined September 2011 Netherlands 1296 Posts #3 no bronze? so reading TL alone will make you better than bronze at minimum? =p Ex organizer of Starcraft Mapmaking Association, currently retired.

Cyberonic Profile Blog Joined September 2011 Germany 79 Posts #4 On August 25 2013 06:32 TheRabidDeer wrote:

Higher league = better at multitasking

However, this isnt relevant to weekly time invested into the game?



Well, only master's players were better than the other leagues. I couldn't find any difference between Diamond and Gold for example. Also, with this type of study I cannot say anything about their causal relationship. Meaning that it could be that either master's players are better at multtitasking because of playing in the Master league OR people who are better at multitasking (for whatever reason) are more likely to be in the master league.



And yes, I didn't find any influence of the weekly time invested into SC2 on multitasking. Well, only master's players were better than the other leagues. I couldn't find any difference between Diamond and Gold for example. Also, with this type of study I cannot say anything about their causal relationship. Meaning that it could be that either master's players are better at multtitasking because of playing in the Master league OR people who are better at multitasking (for whatever reason) are more likely to be in the master league.And yes, I didn't find any influence of the weekly time invested into SC2 on multitasking.

Alakaslam Profile Blog Joined September 2011 United States 14076 Posts #5 On August 25 2013 06:37 19Meavis93 wrote:

no bronze? so reading TL alone will make you better than bronze at minimum? =p

No



But our opinion isn't worth it because since we read TL, we probably would be silver if we played more than half an hour a week consistently.



I rarely hit one hour a month, that's why I'm bronze. Gotta move outta momma's house! That's not cheap, if you do it right (debt-free short of a mortgage...). NoBut our opinion isn't worth it because since we read TL, we probably would be silver if we played more than half an hour a week consistently.I rarely hit one hour a month, that's why I'm bronze. Gotta move outta momma's house! That's not cheap, if you do it right (debt-free short of a mortgage...). Come play Diplomacy with us!

felisconcolori Profile Blog Joined October 2011 United States 6166 Posts #6 So, the basic take away I'm seeing from your study is the following -



- More study is needed to increase the sample size, refine methodology, and better clarify any possible results (this is probably common to most every study I've ever seen)

- Playing more SC2 could be either because of life satisfaction, or more SC2 play could decrease life satisfaction because of investing a lot of time but not getting the results desired.

- Older people play less SC2, which is kind of expected when you factor in increasing time demands and responsibilities. I think older people in general have less time to devote to games



It would be interesting to see your study done with a slightly more strict methodology and over a longer time frame. Still, excellent work on just performing such research. Yes, I email sponsors... to thank them. Don't post drunk, kids. My king, what has become of you?

Cyberonic Profile Blog Joined September 2011 Germany 79 Posts #7



yup, that's pretty much it On August 25 2013 08:13 felisconcolori wrote:

It would be interesting to see your study done with a slightly more strict methodology and over a longer time frame.



definitly! definitly!

Swarmy Profile Joined July 2008 Canada 70 Posts #8 From what I've read, "multitasking" does not generalize from one set of activities to another. It's not surprising that playing more starcraft is not correlated with better "multitasking" of unrelated activities (although I don't know how similar your multitasking game was to actually playing starcraft). I'm not convinced there is any kind of standardized "multitasking" ability underlying all types of multitasking.

NSGrendel Profile Joined August 2010 United Kingdom 235 Posts #9 Given that women are alleged to be be better at multitasking, this completely failed to tell me anything I cared about, demographically. :/ But I respect the effort that went into the study and thank you for your efforts.

tomastaz Profile Joined January 2013 United States 973 Posts #10 Interesting. Thanks for the info. No church in the wild --- @tzhang0126

Antylamon Profile Joined March 2011 United States 1980 Posts Last Edited: 2013-08-25 08:07:46 #11



EDIT: Nvm, hit 77. I guess my fingers hate using WASD.



I'm so embarrassed. My high score is about 58. T_TEDIT: Nvm, hit 77. I guess my fingers hate using WASD. On August 25 2013 06:27 Cyberonic wrote:

They were also better than Grandmaster players but this is most likely due to small sample size of only 3 Grandmaster players in my data set.

Relatively speaking, isn't 50 a small sample size as well? Relatively speaking, isn't 50 a small sample size as well?

Cyberonic Profile Blog Joined September 2011 Germany 79 Posts #12 On August 25 2013 09:30 Swarmy wrote:

I'm not convinced there is any kind of standardized "multitasking" ability underlying all types of multitasking.



In psychological research multitasking is usually investigatedwith dual task paradigms. It was shown that there's a bottleneck when tasks (even simple ones) have to be performed at the same time. That's not what I wanted to focus on here. I thought that maybe SC2 could enhance apparant multitasking which is in reality more due to an increased ability of planning and sticking to "mental cycles" on where to allocate attention. In my eyes, this is both necessary in SC2 (minerals -> minimap -> center -> build worker -> etc) and the multitask game (let top, right top, right bottom, etc).



In psychological research multitasking is usually investigatedwith dual task paradigms. It was shown that there's a bottleneck when tasks (even simple ones) have to be performed at the same time. That's not what I wanted to focus on here. I thought that maybe SC2 could enhance apparant multitasking which is in reality more due to an increased ability of planning and sticking to "mental cycles" on where to allocate attention. In my eyes, this is both necessary in SC2 (minerals -> minimap -> center -> build worker -> etc) and the multitask game (let top, right top, right bottom, etc).

RandomDT Profile Joined February 2013 3 Posts #13 Im just curious what was the highest score?

Cyberonic Profile Blog Joined September 2011 Germany 79 Posts Last Edited: 2013-08-26 09:21:20 #14 Woops, I should have mentioned that in the OP...

The longest time reported was 262 seconds. The average of all participants was 70 seconds.

RandomDT Profile Joined February 2013 3 Posts #15 well i guess then im almost the best, my highest score was 256



Antylamon Profile Joined March 2011 United States 1980 Posts Last Edited: 2013-08-30 18:30:59 #16 On August 30 2013 22:49 RandomDT wrote:

well i guess then im almost the best, my highest score was 256



High score 334, avg 263. Shameless bragging.



I don't think the Multitask score is the most important piece of data, though. I found the satisfaction with life to hours of SC2 correlation to be quite interesting. High score 334, avg 263. Shameless bragging.I don't think the Multitask score is the most important piece of data, though. I found the satisfaction with life to hours of SC2 correlation to be quite interesting.

[UoN]Sentinel Profile Blog Joined November 2009 United States 11241 Posts #17 197! http://i.imgur.com/aRzS1zl.png | Après nous, le soleil