Introverted elves & conscientious gnomes: the expression of personality in World of Warcraft

Personality inference can be used for dynamic personalization of content or system customization. In this study, we examined whether and how personality is expressed in Virtual Worlds (VWs). Survey data from 1,040 World of Warcraft players containing demographic and personality variables was paired with their VW behavioral metrics over a four-month period. Many behavioral cues in VWs were found to be related to personality. For example, Extraverts prefer group activities over solo activities. We also found that these behavioral indicators can be used to infer a players personality.

Citation

Yee, N.; Ducheneaut, N.; Nelson, L.; Likarish, P. Introverted elves & conscientious gnomes: the expression of personality in World of Warcraft. ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems; 2011 May 7-12; Vancouver, BC, Canada.