Understanding Children's Avatar Making in Social Online Games

2025-02-25

AI Summary

This study investigates the motivations underlying avatar creation and customization among 8–13-year-old children in social online games (e.g., Minecraft, Roblox) and its implications for identity development. Employing semi-structured interviews and naturalistic gameplay observation across 48 participants, complemented by thematic analysis, the research identifies four primary motivational dimensions: self-representation, proxy identity exploration, social need fulfillment, and gameplay performance optimization. It introduces the novel “wardrobe effect”—a behavioral pattern wherein children produce multiple avatars but consistently deploy only one—thereby illuminating tensions among cultural consumerism, identity experimentation, and social conformity. The findings yield empirically grounded design principles and policy recommendations to support healthy digital identity development in childhood.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: Game Design — Virtual Humans, NPCs and Autonomous Characters
• Application Domains: Humanities & Computational Social Science
• Cognitive Modeling & Cognitive Systems: Computational Creativity

Application Category

• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: Studies of user behavior, including longitudinal effects of personalized systems
• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: Fairness, privacy, and diversity in economic environments
• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy

Abstract

Social online games like Minecraft and Roblox have become increasingly integral to children's daily lives. Our study explores how children aged 8 to 13 create and customize avatars in these virtual environments. Through semi-structured interviews and gameplay observations with 48 participants, we investigate the motivations behind children's avatar-making. Our findings show that children's avatar creation is motivated by self-representation, experimenting with alter ego identities, fulfilling social needs, and improving in-game performance. In addition, designed monetization strategies play a role in shaping children's avatars. We identify the ''wardrobe effect,'' where children create multiple avatars but typically use only one favorite consistently. We discuss the impact of cultural consumerism and how social games can support children's identity exploration while balancing self-expression and social conformity. This work contributes to understanding how avatar shapes children's identity growth in social online games.

Problem

• Children's avatar creation motivations
• Impact of monetization on avatars
• Avatar's role in identity growth

Innovation

• semi-structured interviews
• gameplay observations
• wardrobe effect analysis