A Quantitative Study of Ethnicity and Gender in Video Games

By John Farrier in Toys on Sep 22, 2009 at 4:16 pm

Dmitri Williams of the University of Southern California at Los Angeles, et al., conducted a census of video game characters and concluded that non-Whites and women were vastly underrepresented:

Seasoned gamers were recruited to play each game for 30 minutes. The researchers analysed video of the sessions and recorded the demographics of each character that appeared on screen, no matter how briefly. They then weighted the results in proportion to each game’s sales. For example, characters in a game selling 2 million copies counted for twice as many character stereotype impressions as those in a game selling 1 million.[...]

Williams and his team found that male characters are “vastly more likely to appear” in games than females. They made up 85 per cent of characters, compared to 51 per cent of the real population.

Compared to the real population, African Americans were under-represented by 13 per cent and Hispanic/Latino people by 78 per cent. Asians were over-represented by 25 per cent and white people by 7 per cent.

The researchers also noted that video games originating in Asia demonstrated a similar disparity.

Link via Popular Science

Image: flickr user Gamer Score Blog used under Creative Commons License.

Tags: Dmitri Williams, ethnicity, Gender

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ByrdBrain
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 4:41 pm
So…?
Edward
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Game characters are well considered by their creators. Cataloging the distribution of ethnicity in real societies might be of interest. But since every game society is the result of intelligent design, wouldn’t it generate more useful information if the researchers asked those creators why they made their choices?
alistair
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 5:14 pm
however aliens and zombies were vastly over represneted
Alex
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 5:14 pm
It’s because plumbers, hedgehogs, zombies, monsters, and other fantastic characters are over-represented in video games, of course.
Kalel
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 5:30 pm
Hollywood has a bit of the same problem: If an ethnic character is included, then any possible negative associaton with that character risks controversy and backlash.
ted
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 6:00 pm
I’ve seen a number of video games where you can alter the features, including the ethnicity, of your character.
wigglesPEsquire
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 7:04 pm
I would think the male/female thing would be obvious. People are much more likely to play a character with their own gender and males play video games much more than females.
wigglesPEsquire
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 7:04 pm
Also, do elves count as a minority?
Friday
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 7:58 pm
So, is this the “omg that’s sexist” du jour?

Male gamers far outnumber female gamers. Quite often, gamers want to play as a character of their own gender. Two plus two equals four.
Kalel
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 9:14 pm
Although it is not specified, I believe the story is about in-game characters, and not player-made characters.

I’m sure player-made characters would be a very different set of results.
Justin
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 9:45 pm
Well I imagine a good chunk of the games surveyed were games that focused on professions already heavily male dominated in real life. Such as war games, or professional sports games.
Justin
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 10:08 pm
Alright, I managed to actually read the study through my school’s library. Apparently they took the top selling video games from each console/pc as of 2005-2006. They then weighed games depending on how many copies were sold. So if one game sold 4 million copies and another sold 2 million, the 4 million one had double the value.

The thing that really annoys me is they don’t list the specific games they used which I find really sloppy. However, if we think about this logically, the vast majority of top selling games are either war related or sports related.

I don’t discount that women are featured less prominently than men. However, I believe the sample of games they used made it impossible to realisticly expect a 50:50 ratio.
samlive the red
Sep 22nd, 2009 at 11:58 pm
whats the big deal here? what am i supposed to take away from this study?
Jo
Sep 23rd, 2009 at 7:28 am
It’s not that women don’t play computer games, but they tend to dominate in more abstract game genres, rather than the first- or third-person views that were probably studied here. Tetris and Bejeweled don’t have gendered avatars in game so much.
c0ldfish
Sep 23rd, 2009 at 9:11 am
“abstract” game genre. why do girls play those games? BEJEWELED?? what the heck? anyways, yeah, no big deal. asian and white men make video games and primarily asian and white men play them.

i used to play smash bros competitively though and i have to say that black men are surprisingly engaged in the video game community as well. this alludes to what is probably the biggest injustice.
chumpychump
Sep 23rd, 2009 at 11:30 am
This comes on the heels of a post that says men are more likely to be hit by lightning. I think it’s a fair trade.
Maria
Sep 23rd, 2009 at 6:55 pm
This is so stupid. I don’t feel under represented. Tons more males play computer games than females so it’s expected. And gosh! Those Asian developers over representing Asians in Asia! Who would have thought? What IS the world coming to?!
… What a waste of research money.
Camilla
Sep 24th, 2009 at 6:40 am
Games are fun regardless of the characters’ genres or race. I also don’t understand what’s to be taken away from this study.
MightyCow
Sep 25th, 2009 at 2:59 am
In other news, men are almost completely unrepresented in commercials for feminine hygiene products, even though they make up almost half the population of the world!

Sexism!
Foreigner1
Sep 25th, 2009 at 3:08 am
Well I just like Rihanna that is pictured with this topic…!

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