The Research On Online Gamer Identity And Game Loyalty

With the continuous development of internet and communication technology, human have also increasingly expanded social interactions. The proportion of traditional face-to-face communication has decreased in daily life, while conveying information through media becomes the principle part. CMC(Computer-Mediated Communication) is not only the center of our life, but also the hotspot attracting more and more attention among specialists and scholars. Online game, one of the forms of CMC, has been attached increasing importance by scholars as a result of its constant development. Based on previous researches and from perspectives of social identity, social presence and social capital theory, this thesis studies various indexes of on-line game players through on-line and off-line questionnaires, including social network, sense of community, mutual dependence, converted capital and game identity. Based on the survey, this thesis will answer 3 key questions, including the relationship between online gamer identity and game loyalty, different online game behaviors with different gamer identity and indexes influencing online gamer identity and game loyalty. According to data analysis results, players’ game identity has significant influence on the persistent behavior of playing on-line games. Besides, among those indexes which can affect the persistent behavior of playing on-line games, players’ game identity is obviously relevant to indexes found in previous researches. In general, play frequency, network convergence and relational switching cost are important indexes which can influence on-line gamer identity and game loyalty. Through investigations on game loyalty from the perspective of social identity theory, this thesis not only enriches preceding researches of different disciplines within this field, such as psychology, sociology and communications, but also provides a new evidence for future researches on the on-line behaviors of on-line game players.