Esports as a Cultural Microcosm for Studying Psycholinguistics

Abstract

Esports have become increasingly popular as naturalistic experimental settings. In large part, this popularity is due to esports helping researchers balance ecological validity and experimental control; esports provide situations in which people are naturally motivated to learn and act in a complex yet restricted environment. Since players often learn and act collaboratively, many researchers have used esports as a setting in which to study communication. However, most of this research has focused on optimizing team performance or player experience, with less work examining fundamental questions of psycholinguistics. Esports offer unique opportunities in this regard, particularly for studying psycholinguistics in the context of prior knowledge, emergent expertise, and emergent culture. The present paper describes a case study that demonstrates the benefits of using an esport as a microcosm for studying psycholinguistics and points to opportunities for further exploration.