Matthew Lee just got a Fulbright Scholarship to research how to make online gaming communities a better place on the internet.

To Lee’s knowledge, it’s one of the first Fulbright Scholarships awarded to the study of online games.

Lee, 29, is a Ph.D. candidate at Penn’s nursing school, which is a place that’s surprisingly rife with innovation: it’s one of three nursing schools in the country that offers a scholarship focused on health innovation. Lee is one of those scholars. He also works with the school’s Health Technology Lab.

He’s a rising star in the gaming world, for sure. Last year, he was named an International Game Developers Association scholar, one of the most coveted awards in the game developer community.

As for his project, Lee hopes to develop ways to foster openness and collaboration in the online gaming community, since in many places, that’s not the norm. (As one writer described the game League of Legends: “It often feels that when you aren’t playing with four other friends, chances are you’re going to run into the scum of the earth.”)

Lee wrote:

It’s my hope that eventually, this data can be useful in developing new therapeutic applications for games, and in improving the mental health of those online today, something I’m quite passionate about as a nurse, game designer, and as the chair of the International Game Developers Association’s Serious Game Group.

He’ll leave for Australia this January and plans to return to Penn once his year-long scholarship is over.

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