Any good gamer can kick your ass in an online duel, but only younger gamers want to. It seems the older you get, the less competitive a gamer you become.

Games research company Quantic Foundry, headed by researcher Nick Yee has recently released results of their study on gaming motivation as it relates to age. (Although you may not realize it, the average videogamer is 35 years old.)

And it seems that, as with the rest of life, motivation changes with age.

QF learned that younger people tend to play more competitively, that is, with “duels, matches, or team-vs-team scenarios.” The desire for competitive gameplay decreases each year.

You may think that male gamers would be more competitive than female gamers—and you would be right. But only in younger gamers.

According to Yee, “The gender difference in Competition is large at first among younger gamers, but then disappears with age. As gamers get older, the appeal of Competition declines, but this happens more rapidly for men than for women. Thus, by the time we’re past 45, the difference between men and women largely disappear.”

The most stable motivation for gaming? Strategy. It seems that gamers of all ages and genders play to strategize. However, men seem to play for the thrill of planning and executing plans more than women.

There you have it: Age, not gender, is a predictor of competitive gameplay.

This means we can say, with a tiny bit of authority, that the rando who spawn-camped you likely is a teenager living in his mother’s basement.



Feature Image Credit: alper/flickr