Unveiling the Siren Effect: Why Female Gamers Flock to Sultry Avatars
A character’s sexiness and power both influence how players view them, but these perceptions change depending on whether the player is simply watching or actively interacting with the character.
Experiment 1: Effects of viewing female characters
The first experiment included 239 college students majoring in communication, with the majority of participants being female. Ages ranged from 18 to 51, but were generally younger. Researchers used Soul Calibur 6 to create four different female character types: Each character was customized to represent one of four combinations of sexualization and strength – high sexualization, high strength, high sexualization, low strength, low sexualization, high power and low sexualization, low power.
After the viewing, participants also completed a choice survey selecting the character they would prefer to play.
Interestingly, gender-based differences emerged in role preferences. Female participants generally disliked highly sexualized characters but were more likely to choose characters with highly feminine traits (often associated with higher sexualization cues). Male participants, on the other hand, tended to choose strong but less sexualized characters, indicating different gender preferences in interpreting character traits.
“Still, I was surprised that in our first study, women still chose the most sexualized character when asked which one to choose. It’s important to remember that this character was also rated as the most feminine, so women may simply have chosen the character they identify with most。”
Experiment 2: The impact of active control on the impression of female characters
Based on these findings, the researchers conducted a second experiment to evaluate whether taking a controlling role (as opposed to passive viewing) affected participants’ perceptions. The experiment involved 438 college students and followed a similar design, using the same four character types as the first experiment. However, instead of watching pre-recorded clips, participants assume the role of one of four character types and engage in live simulated combat.
Gender differences were again observed in this experiment, particularly in ability ratings. Female participants rated high-intensity roles as more competent than low-intensity roles, whereas this difference among male participants was not significant. This difference suggests that female participants may have stronger positive reactions to the strength of female characters, perceiving them as more effective or capable.
