A Research On Fans’ Socialization Of E-sports Events From The Perspective Of Interactive Ritual Chains

As the core of the e-sports industry chain,e-sports events have been happening frequently in recent years.In 2019,the General Office of the State Council issued the "Opinions on Promoting National Fitness and Sports Consumption to Promote the High-Quality Development of the Sports Industry".With the requirements of "promoting the sports industry to become a pillar industry of the national economy" and "high-quality development",e-sports spectators have become huge.Become a force that cannot be ignored in society.As a new type of fan groups,they have distinctive features that distinguish them from other fan communities.While they have promoted the cultural development of e-sports and the industrial economy,they have also been negative labeled as "moral anomie","malicious incitement to war" and "only flow theory".If not positively guided,will cause serious harm to the e-sports industry.As the external representation of e-sports and the e-sports industry,the development of the fan community is closely related to the smooth development of e-sports and the high-quality development of the main players in the industry chain.As a result,the regulation of fan interaction behavior and the management and control of the public opinion environment of e-sports events are imminent.This research selects the current most popular League of Legends Pro League as the background,and the most typical Weibo Chaohua community as the platform to study the fan groups of e-sports events.Based on the theory of interactive ritual chains proposed by American sociologist Randall Collins,it is based on "e-sports event fan group portrait,fan group interactive ritual chains formation judgment,different fan community identification and interaction analysis,the result of fan group interactive ceremony,the problems discovery in the process of fan interaction,the countermeasures and suggestions for the development of the fan community in e-sports events".This study uses a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods to analyze the interactive behavior of fans in e-sports events.The study found that the interactive behaviors of fans of League of Legends Pro League in Weibo Chaohua community are generally embodied in posting,reposting,commenting,and liking,and the interactive mode of commenting is the main way.Based on the theoretical model of the interactive ritual chains,it is found that the fan groups of e-sports events have the four elements of the formation of the interactive ritual chain during the interaction process: physical coexistence,barriers that exclude outsiders,mutual focus and shared emotional experience,and can form complete interactive ritual chains.According to the user interaction relationship in the Weibo Chaohua community and supplemented by other user characteristics,it is found that e-sports fans mainly exist in five types of fan communities,namely: private group constructed by ordinary users,professional group constructed by e-sports practitioners,information acquisition group constructed by e-sports media bloggers and ordinary users,"star chaser" group constructed by e-sports practitioners and ordinary users,and temporary groups constructed by "emotional resonance" users.Each community has different interactive characteristics and interactive behaviors.After the completion of the interactive ceremony,fans of e-sports events produced a variety of cultural materials.In the continuous reserve of emotional energy,they gradually formed group identity,achieved higher group unity,and accelerated the formation of group moral standards.However,research has found that fans of e-sports events as a whole and various communities also have some problems in their interactions.Based on the above conclusions,this research provides countermeasures and suggestions from the fans as a whole and from each community:For the fans as a whole: First,strengthen macro-control and clarify the cultural value orientation;Second,promote the integration and development of new technologies,and promote a sense of presence.The third is to promote the emotional operation of fans and maintain the sustainable development of the fan community.For each community: the first category is to control users’ literacy and establish a user reputation mechanism;the second category is to restrict one’s own behavior and focus on professional technology;the third category is to focus on media literacy and conduct correct guidance;the fourth category is standardize idol behavior and clarify value orientation;the fifth category is to accumulate emotional energy and maintain group continuously.This research further enriches the types of fans studied in the fan community by analyzing these newly formed fan groups.By identifying different small communities in the e-sports fan community,it can provide more targeted countermeasures and suggestions for the specification of each fan community,so as to regulate the e-sports fan group and further build a good e-sports public opinion environment.