Analysis of Empathic Experiences in Video Games with Microblogging

Abstract

Empathy refers to what people experience and feel. Experts believed that empathy is an emotional intelligence skill that can be trained and taught. Therefore, it is very important to explore ways to experience and teach emotional empathy. Empathy experiences can be stimulated by reading fiction and other narratives, storytelling, watching movies, and also playing computer games. In this work, our objective is to investigate the effect of video gaming on empathy using a microblogging tool designed to collect user experiences related to empathy. The aim of this research is to contribute by providing a tool to teach, experience, and measure empathy. This research applies quantitative and qualitative methods. We conducted two studies: (1) investigating the correlation between empathic experiences and video games, and (2) a laboratory experiment to evaluate microblogs as a tool for interviews and media to express feelings or opinions related to empathy. Quantitative data were obtained from the IRI questionnaire.  We developed and implemented a microblogging tool. Study 1 involved 100 participants, and study 2 involved 43 participants. As a result, we find that during the interventions, mean scores increase more for male than for female participants. The impact of playing the video game toward empathy is to raise players' fantasies. The game's story or narrative has the most important role to affect players' feelings. We also explore the potential of a microblogging tool for acquiring qualitative data related to empathy experiences and the effect of playing games.