Impacts of real-world need satisfaction on online gamer loyalty: Perspective of self-affirmation theory

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Computers in Human Behavior journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/comphumbeh

Impacts of real-world need satisfaction on online gamer loyalty: Perspective of self-affirmation theory☆ Gen-Yih Liao a, b, Thi Tuan Linh Pham c, d, T.C.E. Cheng e, Ching-I Teng c, f, g, * a

Department of Information Management, Chang Gung University, Taiwan Department of Nursing, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Taoyuan Branch, Taiwan c Graduate Institute of Business and Management, Chang Gung University, Taiwan d International School, Thai Nguyen University, Viet Nam e Department of Logistics and Maritime Studies, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong f Department of Rehabilitation, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Linkou, Taiwan g Department of Business and Management, Ming Chi University of Technology, Taiwan b

A R T I C L E I N F O

A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Online game Loyalty Self-affirmation self-worth need satisfaction Survey Structural equation modeling

Online games are known for fulfilling computer users’ various needs. However, little is known about whether real-world need satisfaction (not gaming satisfaction) motivates users to play online games. Grounded in selfaffirmation theory (SAT), we develop a framework and formulate hypotheses to explain how aspects of realworld need satisfaction affect online gamer loyalty. We collect 1965 valid responses using an online survey and apply structural equation modelling for hypothesis testing. We find that competence need satisfaction and relatedness need satisfaction are positively related to self-worth, which is, in turn, positively related to online gamer loyalty. Our study is the first introducing self-worth to explain online gamer loyalty. Our findings inform online game providers that they could remind users of their real-world achievements and relations, elevating their perceptions of real-world need satisfaction, so lifting gamers’ self-worth and loyalty.

1. Introduction Online games are popular e-commerce applications that bring considerable revenues to the game-offering firms. For example, online games generated a global revenue of US$137.9 billion (NewZoo, 2019). Moreover, the number of worldwide online gamers was 575 million in 2017 and was expected to reach 645 million by 2021 (Plarium, 2017). This huge number indicates that online games are popular IS applica­ tions for leisure, establishing the importance of further research on online games. Online games could contribute stable revenues to the game-offering firms as players continue to play the same games, i.e., player loyalty to online games. Moreover, continued playing (or enhanced engagement) motivates gamers to purchase in-game content (Hamari et al., 2017a; Jin, Sun, Wang, & Zhang, 2017) or virtual goods (Hamari, 2015), engage €blom, To €rho €nen, Hamari, & Macey, 2019), watch in game streaming (Sjo

€blom, 2017) that provide additional business e-sports (Hamari & Sjo opportunities of e-sports (Macey & Hamari, 2018). Furthermore, games can provide advertising opportunities, contributing revenues to the e-commerce firms (Vashisht & Sreejesh, 2017), further affirming the importance of online gamer loyalty. In a broader context, contemporary online gaming in the real world is typically characterized by play (Calleja, 2010). Differing significantly from the everyday non-game context, online games provide gratification to gamers (Chen, Chen, & Ross, 2010). So online games have been regarded as a world to escape from the real world (Warmelink, Harte­ veld, & Mayer, 2009) or a myth for socio-emotionally dissatisfied gamers (Herodotou, Kambouri, & Winters, 2014), triggering the ques­ tion that whether online games are places accommodating individuals that have satisfied or dissatisfied needs in the real world. This question has been insufficiently addressed in the literature. One study finds that elementary school students that are more satisfied in the real world

☆ The authors thank Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (MOST 107-2410-H-182-003) and Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Taiwan for financial support (BMRP644, BMRP745). * Corresponding author. 259, Wenhua 1st Rd, Gueishan, Taoyuan, 333, Taiwan. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (G.-Y. Liao), [email protected] (T.T.L. Pham), [email protected] (T.C.E. Cheng), [email protected] (C.-I. Teng).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2019.09.016 Received 25 April 2019; Received in revised form 22 August 2019; Accepted 19 September 2019 Available online 24 September 2019 0747-5632/© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

spend less time online (Shen, Liu, & Wang, 2013). The study regards online activities as a whole, not explicitly focusing on online games. Moreover, elementary school students may be different from the entire online gaming population. Therefore, the question remains unanswered. Another study examines the correlations among three needs satis­ faction and gaming frequency (Herodotou et al., 2014) and dispels the myth that gamers are socio-emotionally dissatisfied, supporting our study. Compared with that study, our study is new in two aspects. First, that study does not examine loyalty, i.e., the intention to repeatedly play a game, which is new in our study. Second, that study does not build a framework to explain the mechanism underlying the impact of need satisfaction, but our study does, by using self-worth. These aspects demonstrate the newness of our study in answering the question. This unanswered question creates the problem for online game managers that whether they should target individuals that are satisfied or dissatisfied in the real world. This problem is significant, as the means designed to attract satisfied individuals is different from the means designed to attract dissatisfied ones, and likely creates entirely opposite effects. Therefore, game managers urgently need to know whether on­ line games are places that accommodate satisfied or dissatisfied in­ dividuals. The answer is practically relevant, as it could affect the pathway through which managers build user loyalty and select the target market segment, i.e., whether they should target users whose needs are satisfied or not satisfied in the real world. However, there has been no research to address the question. To this end, we search a theoretical foundation to explain the impact of realworld need satisfaction or dissatisfaction. A lack of real-world need satisfaction would pose threats to one’s self-image, which is the essence of self-affirmation theory (SAT). Moreover, SAT could explain how overall evaluation of one’s own self in the real world motivates one’s specific behaviour (e.g., gaming), which is suitable for answering the question, justifying the choice of SAT as our theoretical foundation. We then use SAT to identify the key element of the pathway leading need satisfaction to online gamer loyalty. Specifically, SAT posits that humans have strong motivation to maintain their self-worth, i.e., posi­ tive evaluation of one’s self (Sherman & Cohen, 2006), indicating the key role of self-worth, supporting its inclusion. Moreover, to specifically answer the research question, we need a widely adopted typology of the basic human needs. Humans have three basic needs, namely needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness (Deci & Ryan, 2000). The three basic needs are also critical for online gamers. Specifically, satisfaction of these needs is important to online gamers (Herodotou et al., 2014; Johnson, Gardner, & Sweetser, 2016), justifying the inclusion of au­ tonomy need satisfaction (fulfillment of the desire for being generally free and self-congruent over time), competence need satisfaction (fulfillment of the desire for feeling capable of engaging in a certain activity), and relatedness need satisfaction (fulfillment of the desire for being socially connected with others) in our research model. In sum, we use these el­ ements to build the framework, i.e., use self-worth as the link between need satisfaction and loyalty. Hence, the purpose of this study is to examine how aspects of realworld need satisfaction impact self-worth and online gamer loyalty. The overall contribution of this study is to theorize the impacts of realworld satisfaction of the three important human needs on online gamer loyalty, building a platform for future research on how real-world satisfaction would impact online gamer loyalty. This study is needed from both theoretical and practical perspectives. Theoretically, this study introduces aspects of real-world satisfaction to SAT, adding what we did not know before to this theory. Practically, this study identifies novel elements for crafting targeting strategies, i.e., targeting at those who have their needs satisfied in the real-world, thus effectively fostering loyal gamers. Moreover, this study contributes to the pertinent literature in several aspects. First, Hamari and Keronen’s (2017) meta-analysis identified the importance of social factors in explaining playing intention. Moreover, Herodotou et al. (2014) found that relatedness need satisfaction is

related to gamers’ social preferences for play. Following their sugges­ tions, we examine gamers’ continuance behaviour by using relatedness need satisfaction to explain gamers’ continuance intention. Moreover, the present study includes two more needs, i.e., autonomy need and competence need. Inclusion of all the three needs could provide an overall picture on how the three basic needs could explain the formation of online gamer loyalty. Therefore, the present study additionally in­ cludes two more needs satisfaction, i.e., autonomy and competence needs satisfaction. Second, Moon, Hossain, Sanders, Garrity, and Jo (2013) examined social identity in the guild as sources of online gamer loyalty, indicating the importance of psychological satisfaction of social needs. We join in the efforts to examine the sources of online gamer loyalty and echo the importance of satisfaction of social needs. In addition, we include satisfaction of two other needs, i.e., autonomy need and competence need, to come up with a more comprehensive framework to explain the formation of online gamer loyalty. Third, Rezvani, Khosravi, and Dong (2017) examined the usefulness of satisfaction of the three basic needs for motivating continuance intention of using enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. While in line with Rezvani et al. (2017) in exploring the usefulness of satisfaction of the three needs to explain continuance intention, our study is new, i. e., what we did not know before, in examining how satisfaction of the three needs in the real-world, rather than using the ERP. Our study informs future IS research by indicating that real-world satisfaction is important for encouraging users’ continuance intention of using IS. The literature on the link between satisfaction and loyalty (e.g., Herodotou et al., 2014; Tseng, Pham, Cheng, & Teng, 2018) has verified the link in various contexts, including online shopping (Fang, Chiu, & Wang, 2011) and ERP systems (Rezvani et al., 2017). The concept “satisfaction” in the literature refers to satisfaction with the system. However, the concept “satisfaction” in our study refers to satisfaction in the real world. The new concept (real-world need satisfaction) enables future studies to explore its influences, representing the first unique contribution or potential academic impact of our study. This uniqueness indicates that the findings in the extant literature cannot be generalized to our study. Moreover, our study contributes a new source of online gamer loyalty, i.e., real-world need satisfaction. Our study also clarifies the underlying process, i.e., via self-worth, offering new insights for game providers to build gamer loyalty, representing the second unique contribution of our work. 2. Literature review 2.1. Online gamer loyalty Loyalty has various definitions in various fields. The marketing literature defines it in terms of intention to repeatedly use or buy a product, while also including intention to recommend. This may create a conceptual mixture of two concepts: intention to use and intention to recommend. Hence, the e-commerce and human-computer interaction literature defines it in terms of intention to repeatedly use a product (Teng, 2018a; 2018b). Loyalty has also been a focal issue in the e-commerce area, which has identified various antecedents to loyalty, i.e., continuance intention, including trust (Kamboj, Sarmah, Gupta, & Dwivedi, 2018; Zheng, Lee, & Cheung, 2017), gaming task completion (Alha, Koskinen, Paavilainen, & Hamari, 2019), simplicity, interactivity (Lee, Moon, Kim, & Yi, 2015), community participation (Kamboj et al., 2018), word-of mouth partic­ ipation, site identification (Yoo, Sanders, & Moon, 2013), site quality (Luo & Chea, 2018), site interface usability (Pee, Jiang, & Klein, 2018), functional value, self-expressive value, and social value (Tseng, Cheng, Li, & Teng, 2017; Tseng et al., 2018). The wide spectrum of antecedents could be associated with various basic needs, indicating that loyalty to e-commerce applications could be associated with satisfaction of user needs. 92

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

Among e-commerce applications, online games have received sub­ €yry, 2015; stantial research attentions (e.g., Kaptein, Parvinen, & Po Moon et al., 2013). Online gamer loyalty refers to the gamer’s tendency to play a certain game repetitively (Liao & Teng, 2017). Online games are media where gamers communicate with one another. Communica­ tion media users appreciate their satisfaction of autonomy need (Tseng et al., 2018). Moreover, online gamer loyalty may originate from goal proximity and motivation to attain gaming goals (Teng, 2017a), indi­ cating that achieving goals or feeling competent should be important to gamers. Furthermore, online gamer loyalty could originate from sense of community and relational switching cost (Tseng, Huang, & Teng, 2015), indicating that relating to other games should also be important to gamers. In short, such studies demonstrate that gamers should have strong needs of competence and relatedness, supporting our inclusion of all the three basic needs.

propensity and upgrade well-being (Ryan & Deci, 2000). The three needs are the needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. The three needs have been widely applied in various contexts, e.g., man­ agement (Chiniara & Bentein, 2016), learning (Akbari, Pilot, & Simons, 2015), and e-commerce (Tseng et al., 2018). Their wide applications support the universality of the three needs and justify their inclusion in the present study. The three basic needs can be satisfied by playing online games. Specifically, online gamers can freely choose avatars, e.g., in height and attractiveness (Li, Nguyen, Cheng, & Teng, 2018), for representing and expressing themselves, i.e., providing gamers self-expressiveness value, which satisfies autonomy need (Tseng et al., 2018). Moreover, online gamers can obtain various achievement values, including victory and adventure (Lin, Hung, Fang, & Tu, 2015), thus could satisfy competence need. Furthermore, online games include both formal social groups and informal social connections (Shi, Xia, & Huang, 2015), exhibiting inherent sociability (Wu, Cui, Liu, Deng, & Guo, 2018) and satisfying gamers’ relatedness need, justifying the applicability of the three needs in the online gaming context. Online gaming studies have examined the effects of the three basic needs. Gamers having low satisfaction of autonomy need are found to be more interested in achievement preferences. In contrast, low satisfaction of relatedness need reduces gamers’ interest in social preferences for play (Herodotou et al., 2014). All three needs satisfaction are found to be associated with more time spent playing (Johnson et al., 2016). These associations are insightful regarding the importance of gaming satisfac­ tion, not real-world need satisfaction. Therefore, the present study ex­ hibits its newness by examining real-world need satisfaction and its impact on online gameplay. Moreover, satisfaction of the three needs could provide enhanced enjoyment (Pe-Than, Goh, & Lee, 2014). Enjoyment has been empiri­ cally shown to help retain users of gamified IS and hedonic IS. However, few studies have examined the relationships between the three basic needs satisfaction and gamer loyalty, indicating a gap in the literature. Academically, addressing this gap will contribute to broadening the usefulness of the three needs to explain gamer motivation. Practically, the research model implies a simplified approach for managers to pre­ dict gamer loyalty. To fill these gaps, we use SAT to build a framework to connect need satisfaction, self-worth, and loyalty. SAT has been widely used in various online contexts, e.g., social networking sites (Toma & Hancock, 2013) and online games (Howell & Shepperd, 2012), justifying the applica­ bility of SAT in the online gaming context. Moreover, online games could fulfill various needs (Wu, Wang, & Tsai, 2010), indicating that online games provide a suitable context in which individuals’ needs are examined. Furthermore, SAT has been applied to online games (Velez & Hanus, 2016), indicating that the key element of SAT, i.e., self-worth, can be applied in the online gaming context. This is supported by the finding that frustration, which likely impacts self-worth, is important for determining gaming behaviour (Liao, Huang, & Teng, 2016).

2.2. Self-affirmation theory (SAT) SAT posits that individuals are strongly motivated to maintain selfworth (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Self-worth represents positive evalu­ ation of one’s self, and thus reflects a positive self-image, which could motivate users to receive mobile advertisements (Shareef, Dwivedi, Kumar, & Kumar, 2017). The empirical findings portrait the importance of maintaining users’ positive self-image in delivering e-commerce ser­ vices, warranting further research on positive self-image, or self-worth. However, self-worth has received relatively little attention in e-com­ merce research, indicating the opportunities for advancing the current e-commerce knowledge. SAT also posits that self-affirmation is a process of promoting in­ dividuals to focus on their own self-worth (Howell & Shepperd, 2012). Self-worth represents a basic need to maintain one’s own self-image that includes being competent and capable of making free choices (Steele, 1988). Being competent may reflect the desire to meet competence need satisfaction, i.e., SAT can be used to infer a link between competence need satisfaction and self-worth. Moreover, being capable of making free choices may reflect the desire to meet autonomy need satisfaction, i. e., SAT can be used to infer a link between autonomy need satisfaction and self-worth. Furthermore, affirmation could come from social con­ nections (Toma & Hancock, 2013), revealing the potential link between relatedness need satisfaction and self-worth. Self-worth has a similar term - self-esteem. Self-esteem refers to positive views of one’s self, while self-worth is positive evaluation of one’s self (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Their definitions are similar, but with subtle differences. Self-esteem is regarded as a uni-dimensional concept as “global self-worth” (Rosenberg, 1965). This view is a clas­ sical one. In this sense, self-esteem is the same as self-worth. We agree with the same conceptualization. The subsequent literature has also conceptualized self-esteem as a multi-dimensional concept, comprising self-worth, self-regard, self-efficacy, and confidence (Longworth, Dea­ kins, Rose, & Gracey, 2018). In this sense, self-worth is part of self-esteem, creating potential confusion. Therefore, we follow the SAT literature in using the term self-worth (Cohen et al., 2010; Knowles, Lucas, Molden, Gardner, & Dean, 2010), enabling connection to the pertinent theoretical knowledge. SAT has interchangeably used the terms self-esteem and self-image (Steele, 1988; Steele, Spencer, & Lynch, 1993). Both terms are defined as positive views of the self, indicating that they are conceptually the same. Also, to better connect to the SAT literature (Cohen et al., 2010; Knowles et al., 2010), we use the term self-worth, which focuses on evaluations of one’s values, skills, and accomplishments (Knowles et al., 2010).

3. Development of hypotheses According to SAT, self-worth represents positive evaluation of one’s self that reflects a positive self-image (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Such a positive self-image enables individuals to believe in their own merits and abilities, implying the possibility that they could overcome chal­ lenges and achieve success, bringing about happiness (Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vohs, 2003). Therefore, online gamers with enhanced self-worth more likely overcome challenges and perceive happiness, motivating them to repeatedly play an online game. The intention of repeated use represents user loyalty (Yoo et al., 2013), i.e., online gamer loyalty. Moreover, achieving success would enhance gamers’ expectancy to achieve future success, further fuelling online gamer loyalty (Liao & Teng, 2017). Thus, we hypothesize:

2.3. Three basic needs The three basic needs are recognized as a well-defined typology of human needs. Satisfaction of the three needs could fulfill growth 93

G.-Y. Liao et al.

H1:.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

Self-worth is positively related to online gamer loyalty.

Autonomy need satisfaction is defined as individuals’ satisfaction with the freedom of making task-related decisions (Chen, Vansteenkiste, Beyers, Boone, Deci, Van der Kaap-Deeder & Ryan, 2015), including the decisions on how to express themselves and promote their positive self-images. Positive self-images in SAT represent self-worth (Sherman & Cohen, 2006), thus connecting autonomy need satisfaction to self-worth. This connection is also supported by the verified relation between locus of control and perceived self-worth in a task-oriented environment (Onwuegbuzie & Daley, 1998; Pruessner et al., 2005). In other words, freedom of making task-related decisions leads to internal locus of control, which would enhance one’s own self-worth, i.e., relation be­ tween locus of control and perceived self-worth are related in a task-oriented environment (Onwuegbuzie & Daley, 1998; Pruessner et al., 2005), connecting autonomy need satisfaction to self-worth. Furthermore, autonomy need satisfaction refers to the satisfaction of making free choices (Chen et al., 2015). SAT posits that individuals appreciate being capable of making free choices, thus affirming their self-worth (Steele, 1988) and connecting autonomy need satisfaction to self-worth. Thus, we hypothesize: H2:.

Fig. 1. Research Framework. Note. Dotted lines represent the paths that are not hypothesized.

4. Methods 4.1. Sample and data collection process We collected the data for this study via an online survey from September to October 2018. The cover page states that this study has an interest in the perceptions and lives among online gamers. We asked each participant to nominate an online game they had recently played. This approach conforms to recent online gaming research (Liao et al., 2016; Teng, 2018a). The cover page of the survey also informs the participants that they may join or not and can quit the survey any time. The first item provides the participant with the opportunity to consent their participation, completing the informed consent process, so con­ forming to ethical requirements. We promoted the online survey by two means. First, we posted in­ vitations on various websites and forms where online gamers may frequently visit. Such websites and forums include www.gamer.com.tw and www.dcard.tw/f. Moreover, the participants were eligible to take part in a lottery that awarded gift certificates with an aggregate value of US$ 300. The use of lottery to recruit survey participants is frequently observed in local online surveys. Hence, the lottery may not markedly lead to self-selection bias. We invited the consented participants to rate their nominated game by using the study items, as listed in the online survey. We obtained complete responses from 2228 participants. To increase data validity, we used seven criteria to eliminate invalid responses from those who: (1) had not played the game in the recent month, (2) failed to pass the attention check, i.e., one item only asking the participant to choose “strongly disagreeable” to see whether a participant attended to and follow this instruction, (3) did not nominate an existing game, (4) indicated playing the nominated game longer than their age, (5) played more than 168 h per week, (6) reported an age out of the range between 10 and 80 years old, and (7) provided duplicative email addresses. Re­ sponses meeting each of the seven criteria were excluded from further analyses. In short, the seven criteria require the participants to be serious in completing the questionnaire, so assuring data validity to a certain extent. The exclusion of such responses left 1965 valid responses (88.2% of 2228) for further analyses. The most nominated games are League of Legends (24.8%), Path of Exile (12.3%), Black Desert (9.0%), Hearthstone (8.6%), and Maple Story (5.9%). All these games build immersive gaming worlds, providing sources of need satisfaction, so supporting their suitability in this study.

Autonomy need satisfaction is positively related to self-worth.

Competence need satisfaction is the satisfaction with one’s own abilities in completing (difficult) tasks (Chen et al., 2015). Completion of gaming tasks is one of the major reasons to continue playing online games (Alha et al., 2019). Moreover, competence need satisfaction re­ flects that individuals have made various achievements and accom­ plishments (Lin et al., 2015), leading to positive evaluations. Positive evaluations, values, and accomplishments are the core of self-worth (Knowles et al., 2010), linking competence need satisfaction to self-worth. This link is also established using the definition of self-worth. Competence need satisfaction reflects one’s own capabilities (Chen et al., 2015), which are definitely positive qualities. Possessing good abilities is core to self-worth (Rosenberg, 1965). Furthermore, compe­ tence need satisfaction would enhance gamers’ enjoyment (Tamborini, Bowman, Eden, Grizzard, & Organ, 2010). Such enjoyment creates happiness, which fuels self-worth (Cheng & Furnham, 2004). All these studies support a strong connection between competence need satis­ faction and self-worth. Thus, we hypothesize: H3:.

Competence need satisfaction is positively related to self-worth.

Relatedness need satisfaction indicates individuals’ satisfaction with the social connections (Chen et al., 2015). Social connections are critical in the process of self-affirmation (Toma & Hancock, 2013). Relatedness need satisfaction leads individuals to believe in their capabilities of establishing meaningful emotional bonds (Herodotou et al., 2014). Meaningful emotional bonds are important to creating a positive image of one’s self. A positive image of one’s self is greatly appreciated by individuals according to SAT (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Such capabil­ ities in establishing meaningful emotional bonds are positive qualities that comprise their self-worth (Rosenberg, 1965), building the positive link between relatedness need satisfaction and self-worth. This link can be further inferred by another rationale. Relatedness need satisfaction indicates satisfaction with social relationships (Chen et al., 2015), implying strong social acceptance. Social acceptance further instills a sense of positive image to individuals (DeWall, Maner, & Rouby, 2009), comprising self-worth (Rosenberg, 1965), also linking relatedness need satisfaction and self-worth. Thus, we hypothesize: H4:.

Relatedness need satisfaction is positively related to self-worth.

4.2. Measurement

Fig. 1 depicts our research framework. The framework introduces various novel links (what we did not know before), i.e., all the hy­ potheses are new to the existing knowledge.

We measure real-world autonomy, competence, and relatedness need satisfaction by using 12 items from Chen et al. (2015); (real-world) self-worth by using five items from Rosenberg (1965); and loyalty (to a game) by using four items from Teng (2018a). We also ask each participant to provide information on their gender, age, education, 94

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

income, weekly hours spent in playing the game, and the number of years spent in playing the game. We dropped one item measuring loyalty that has a loading < 0.70, the typical threshold for loadings (Durcikova, Lee, & Brown, 2018; Karahanna, Xu, Xu, & Zhang, 2018). We use a response option ranging from 1 (strongly disagreeable) to 5 (strongly agreeable). We average the scores to items measuring the same construct to denote the level of the construct. Hence, a higher score denotes a higher level of a construct. We list all the study items in the Appendix.

Table 2 Correlations among the study constructs. 1. Loyalty 2. Autonomy Need Satisfaction 3. Competence Need Satisfaction 4. Relatedness Need Satisfaction 5. Self-Worth

To further assess data reliability and validity, we use LISREL v.8.80 software to conduct a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to evaluate the study items. For measuring each construct, the items have Cronbach’s α values exceeding 0.82. Such values have confidence intervals exceeding 0.80, suggesting confident reliability. Moreover, items assessing each construct have composite reliability (CR) values exceeding 0.85 and average variance extracted (AVE) values exceeding 0.59. The entire results indicate adequate reliability. We assess the indicator loadings, all of which exceed 0.70. Moreover, the maximum squared correlation of 0.53 is smaller than the minimum AVE value of 0.59, indicating adequate discriminant validity. The model sufficiently fits the data (CFI ¼ 0.98, IFI ¼ 0.98, NNFI ¼ 0.97, SRMR ¼ 0.03, RMSEA ¼ 0.06). Table 1 reports the CFA results. Table 2 lists the correlations among the study constructs. All the correlations range from 0.12 to 0.61, with one exception, i.e., the cor­ relation (r ¼ 0.73) between competence need satisfaction and selfworth. This correlation is theoretically reasonable. Competence could contribute to external rewards, thus contributing to self-worth. This correlation is still below the square root of the associated AVE values, i. e., 0.87 and 0.84 in Table 2, supporting the methodological adequacy. To formally test the common method variance (CMV), we follow

M

SD

3.99

0.77

LOY1 LOY2 LOY3 Autonomy Need Satisfaction ANS1 ANS2 ANS3 ANS4 Competence Need Satisfaction CNS1 CNS2 CNS3 CNS4 Relatedness Need Satisfaction RNS1 RNS2 RNS3 RNS4 Self-Worth

4.16 4.14 3.67 3.41

0.79 0.81 0.98 0.77

.92 .93 .82

3.73 3.20 3.34 3.34 3.33

0.93 0.93 0.95 1.02 0.82

.70 .84 .80 .73

3.48 3.17 3.40 3.27 3.59

0.92 0.95 0.93 0.95 0.83

.87 .89 .87 .86

3.50 3.64 3.62 3.60 3.50

0.98 0.94 0.94 0.95 0.82

.88 .96 .86 .74

3.40 3.31 3.58 3.65 3.55

0.99 0.94 0.92 0.94 1.06

.84 .82 .84 .86 .83

SW1 SW2 SW3 SW4 SW5

λ

α

C.I. of α

CR

AVE

.87

[.86, .88]

.92

.79

.82

[.80, .83]

.85

.59

.90

[.89, .91]

.93

.76

.89

[.88, .90]

.92

[.89, .91]

.92

2

3

3.99 3.41 3.33

0.77 0.77 0.82

.89 .16 .12

.77 .61

.87

3.59 3.50

0.83 0.82

.15 .14

.52 .56

.53 .73

4

5

.86 .61

.84

5. Results 5.1. Sample profile We obtained a total of 1965 valid responses for analysis. Some re­ sponses did not include complete information on demographics. We retained such responses to include their information on the study items. As a result, the numbers in demographic data may not always add up to the sample size. We collected gender, age, education, and income as the demographic variables. The gender composition is primarily male (78.5%). The age profile is largely a young adult, i.e., from 20 to 29 years old (65.5%). Moreover, the majority of the participants have higher education, i.e., have received university or college education (70.6%). The participants have an annual income � US$ 10,000.00 (72.3%), reflecting the characteristics of the local population. Online gamers who play the similar game genre are predominately young male, i.e., 95% male with an average age of 23 years old in Bonny and Castaneda (2017) and 96% male with an average age of 22 years old in Meng, Williams, and Shen (2015). The characteristics in the previous studies support that the demographic characteristics of our participants should be considered as adequate. Among the participants, less than 7% refuse to provide the demographic information. We retain their re­ sponses to the main study measures. Table 3 summarizes the de­ mographic profile of the participants. Table 3 Demographic profile of the participants. Variable

Category

Number

Percentage

Gender

Male Female �19 years old 20–29 years old �30 years old High school or below University or college Graduate institute US$ 10,000.00 or less US$ 10,001.00–20,000.00 US$ 20,001.00 or more �2 year >2 years and �4 years >4 years �7 h >7 h and �14 h >14 h and �21 h >21 h

1459 400 476 1217 165 367 1311 181 1323 377

78.5 21.5 25.6 65.5 8.9 19.7 70.6 9.7 72.3 20.6

129 998 458 509 882 417 279 387

7.1 50.8 23.3 25.9 44.9 21.2 14.2 19.7

Age

.75

Education

.90

1

Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, and Podsakoff (2003) by including a construct (named as CMV) to account for the variance of all the con­ structs. The inclusion of the CMV construct makes the model statistically inferior in fitting the data variance, i.e., Δdf ¼ 294–250 ¼ 44, Δχ2 ¼ 3596.66–1934.24 ¼ 1662.42 > χ2(α ¼ 0.05, df ¼ 44) ¼ 60.48. In short, CMV should not be substantial in our original measurement model.

Table 1 Summary of confirmatory factor analysis. Loyalty

SD

Note. M denotes average. SD denotes standard deviation. All the correlations having p values < .05. The numbers on the diagonal are square roots of the AVE values.

4.3. Psychometric properties

Construct-Item

M

Annual income

.70

Year spent playing the online game Weekly hours spent playing the online game

Note. λ denotes indicator loading; α denotes Cronbach’s α; C.I. denotes 95% confidence interval; CR denotes composite reliability; AVE denotes average variance extracted. 95

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

5.2. Hypothesis testing

feeling free to choose what to do (Chen et al., 2015). Feeling free is usually affected by external conditions, e.g., organizational regulations and family responsibilities, rather than one’s internal qualities. There­ fore, feeling free may not always be attributed to one’s self-worth.

We use LISREL v.8.80 software to apply structural equation model­ ling (SEM) to analyze the survey data for hypothesis testing. To test the hypotheses, we examine whether the path coefficients significantly exceed zero. We set the significance threshold at 0.05. Fig. 2 illustrates the SEM results. All the hypotheses are supported by the analytical results. Specif­ ically, self-worth is positively related to online gamer loyalty (path co­ efficient (p.c.) ¼ 0.20, t ¼ 8.32, p < .001), supporting H1. All the autonomy, competence, and relatedness need satisfaction are positively related to self-worth (p.c. ¼ 0.04, 0.63, and 0.27, t ¼ 1.57, 23.41, and 13.42, p > 05, p < .001, and p < .001, respectively), supporting H3 and H4, but not supporting H2. We discuss the reason for not supporting H2 in the next section. The structural model explains 8% of the variance of online gamer loyalty, indicating an effect size between small and me­ dium (Cohen, 1992), supporting the practical relevance of the study. We find that all the control variables appear to be influential in on­ line gamer loyalty. Specifically, female and higher-income gamers report stronger loyalty. Moreover, gaming history (more years spent playing the game) and game usage (more weekly hours spent playing the game) are also positively related to online gamer loyalty. Future works could further examine the mechanisms underlying the impacts of such control variables. To generate more insights, we add the direct paths from the needs satisfaction to loyalty in the model. This addition does not change any of the testing results, supporting the robustness of our findings. One additional finding is that the autonomy need satisfaction has a direct impact on loyalty (p.c. ¼ 0.20, t ¼ 4.85, p < .001). This finding supports that autonomy need satisfaction may follow another pathway leading to loyalty, indicating a future research opportunity.

6.2. Theoretical implications Our findings answer the research question that whether online games are places accommodating individuals that have satisfied or dissatisfied needs in the real world. Our findings support the positive answer, i.e., online games are places that accommodate users that have their needs satisfied in the real world. Such findings are interesting to the broader gaming literature. Specifically, some previous research may regard games as another world to escape from the real world (Warme­ link et al., 2009). This may explain why breaking away from everyday life provides gratification to gamers (Chen et al., 2010). We suppose all these findings in the literature are correct, but our findings indicate that gamers that have their needs satisfied in the real world could be highly loyal to games, providing a new insight for game providers. The reason may be that gamers having their needs satisfied in the real world do not urgently seek for satisfaction in the gaming world. Therefore, such satisfied (in the real world) gamers could tolerate the temporary frus­ tration or discomfort from the gaming experience. Herodotou et al. (2014) examined a gamer sample of one particular game and suggested gamers’ satisfaction of the basic needs (e.g., au­ tonomy need) is related to in-game preferences (e.g., achievement), indicating the importance of understanding gamers from the real-world context. However, our study is unique in examining the impacts of the variables in the real-world context, i.e., real-world needs satisfaction, on gaming intention, advancing knowledge for predicting gaming behav­ iour. Moreover, we also provide a general answer, i.e., self-worth, to explain the mechanism that creates this impact, uniquely introducing this concept, i.e., self-worth, to gaming studies. Our findings indicate that competence need satisfaction and relat­ edness need satisfaction positively contribute to self-worth, and thus to online gamer loyalty. These findings extend SAT by identifying novel sources for enhancing self-worth, i.e., competence need satisfaction and relatedness satisfaction, indicating the theoretical contribution of this study. These novel sources build a platform for future scholars to explore additional means that could satisfy gamers’ competence need and relatedness need, thus fueling gamers’ self-worth. Our findings also contribute to the online gaming literature by clarifying that self-worth should be positively related to gamers’ loyalty. Prior to our study, games may be regarded as shelters that accommodate those who feel degraded self-worth. However, our findings provide ev­ idence supporting that gamers who feel self-worth in general would

6. Discussion 6.1. Main findings and discussion of the non-supported hypothesis We find that gamers’ satisfaction of the needs would positively contribute to self-worth, further resulting in online gamer loyalty. This study is the first to initiate aspects of need satisfaction as antecedents to one’s self-worth, forming a way to playing online games, demonstrating the theoretical newness of this study. We do not find support for the link between autonomy need satis­ faction and self-worth, i.e., H2. This is reasonable, as perceived auton­ omy only explains part of the variation in online behaviour, while online participation is usually voluntary (Yoon & Rolland, 2012; Zhang, Wang, Lin, & Tai, 2015). Moreover, autonomous need can be satisfied by

Fig. 2. Analytical Results. Note. All the coefficients have p values < .05, except for the path marked by a dotted line. 96

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

actively and repeatedly play online games. Our findings should provide a platform for future online gaming studies to further explore when online gamers may seek playing games as shelters and when they may not. We also extend the applicability of SAT. The core element of SAT, self-worth has been applied to the contexts of social media (Stefanone, Lackaff, & Rosen, 2011) and virtual communities (Chiu, Fang, & Wang, 2015). Our study extends the applicability of SAT to online games. This extension contributes to the e-commerce area by indicating the possi­ bility of further extending SAT by exploring how users’ self-worth could be enhanced by well-known influential factors, e.g., trust (Kamboj et al., 2018; Zheng et al., 2017), simplicity, interactivity (Lee et al., 2015), and community participation (Kamboj et al., 2018), in other e-commerce contexts. Merhi (2016) found that social interaction and achievement could predict online gamers’ intention to further play games. Our study is in concordant with Merhi (2016) in examining predictors of online gamers’ play intention. However, our study is new in providing an explanation for Merhi’s (2016) findings. Specifically, achievement may instill in gamers a sense of competence, thus satisfying their competence need. Specifically, future works could replicate Merhi (2016) and use satis­ faction of the three needs to build the mechanism underlying the find­ ings of Merhi (2016). Ding and Lii (2016) examined service failure recovery in online games and found that aspects of justice (e.g., interpersonal justice) could result in satisfaction of service recovery and firm trust, eventually leading to the intention to use the gaming service again, i.e., online gamer loyalty in our study context. While our study is in line with Ding and Lii (2016) in examining sources of online gamer loyalty, we identify novel sources, i.e., satisfaction of three basic needs and self-worth. Hamari and Koivisto (2015) found that continued use of (gamified) services that contain gaming elements could have three categories of motivation, i.e., utilitarian, hedonic, and social. Our study also examines continued use of services that contain the gaming elements, but is new in using another typology of motivation, i.e., three satisfaction needs. Specifically, future researchers could seek linking gamification elements to satisfaction of the three needs, thus explaining continued use of gamified services. Kokkinakis, Lin, Pavlas, and Wade (2016) found that avatar ages and avatar names can be used to predict social interactions in one popular game, i.e., League of Legends (LoL). In the sense that social interactions help satisfy relatedness need, our study also examines social interactions in this popular game, i.e., LoL. However, our work is new in examining satisfaction of all aspects of human needs, i.e., we include autonomy and competence needs. Our study contributes to the literature by leading future studies to further examine how avatar ages and avatar names can predict in-game achievements. The online gaming literature has recently verified various anteced­ ents to online gamer loyalty (or continuance intention), including goal proximity, motivation to attain gaming goals (Teng, 2017a), social presence, avatar identification (Teng, 2017b), personality traits (Huang, Cheng, Huang, & Teng, 2018a), gaming habits (Teng, 2018b), and relational cohesion (Huang, Cheng, Huang, & Teng, 2018b). Compared with those studies, our study is new in proposing and examining how need satisfaction and self-worth form online gamer loyalty, indicating the novelty and contribution of our work.

so exhibiting enhanced loyalty to playing games. Hence, game providers could design their promotions that can evoke prospective and/or current gamers’ perceptions (while not changing the actual status) of their realworld need satisfaction. According to our findings, the evoked satis­ faction could boost gamers’ self-worth and positively contribute to gamers’ loyalty. Moreover, game providers could target users whose needs are satisfied in the real world. Our findings reveal that such users would likely become loyal gamers. We find that competence need satisfaction is positively related to self-worth. Hence, we recommend that online game providers enhance the gaming elements that can trigger gamers’ sense of competence satisfaction before, during, and after their gameplay. Specifically, before starting gameplay, gamers should be informed and instructed about how to manage gaming challenges. Such information and instructions could provide gamers with basic gaming knowledge to maintain gamers’ sense of their competence in the early gaming stage. During gameplay, regular pop-up tips or necessary instructions should be provided to help gamers who fail to overcome any challenges twice or more. Moreover, inspiring messages or visual effects should accompany gaming successes. Furthermore, a complete list of gamers’ accomplishments should be provided as gamers complete a series of gaming tasks or achieve mile­ stones. The design of such a list should fit the “quantified-self” concept to enhance feedback (Hassan, Dias, & Hamari, 2019). Such elements should instill in gamers a sense of competence and help enhance their self-worth. We also find that relatedness need satisfaction is positively related to self-worth. Therefore, online game providers should set up and maintain in-game forums for gamers to join, discuss, and exchange information and experience. Game providers could well maintain such forums by hiring employees to seed interesting information (e.g., news or contro­ versial information) into gamers’ discussions, which may help attract gamers to more actively participate in the discussions and interact with one another, thus satisfying their relatedness needs. In addition, off-line events should also be frequently organized to help gamers connect more tightly to other gamers, thus instilling a feeling of being cared, which is core to related need satisfaction. According to our findings, such satis­ faction could improve gamers’ self-worth, so their loyalty. We do not find that autonomy need satisfaction is related to selfworth. The reason may be that almost all existing commercial online games, designed as hedonic information systems, enable gamers to freely choose their avatars and make significant changes to them. Moreover, most games are designed to offer an enhanced sense of au­ tonomy, enabling gamers to engage in autonomous exploration. As a result, gamers should take autonomy need satisfaction for granted when they play online games, i.e., gamers may not appreciate such autonomy, which thus may not boost any positive self-worth, explaining the nonsupported H2. Thus, game providers could seek means to satisfy gamers’ competence need or relatedness need, rather than autonomy need. Basing on the link between self-worth and online gamer loyalty, game providers could design pop-ups or messages that frequently deliver positive feedback on gamers’ performance in various aspects. Specif­ ically, such aspects could include upgrading of gamers’ avatar levels, best teammate as assessed by team members, best opponent as assessed by rivals, reaching milestones in the gaming history (e.g., the first hundred log-ins, the first hundred hours in playing the game, or the first hundred wins), and reaching milestones in gamers’ relationships (e.g., the anniversaries of joining a specific gaming guild). Such means would establish gamers’ self-worth, thus enhancing their loyalty.

6.3. Managerial implications Participants in this study nominate games without receiving further instructions. Therefore, they may not necessarily nominate their favourite games, nor they are loyal gamers to the nominated games. Moreover, this approach could create a long list of nominated games, increasing the generality of the study findings to most online games. We find that gamers that have their competence need and related­ ness need satisfied in the real world would develop a strong self-worth,

6.4. Research limitations and future research directions We adopt a cross-sectional design and use an online questionnaire to collect data for examining the impacts of psychological experience on online gamer loyalty. This approach is recognized for its suitability for capturing gamers’ characteristics and experience. Moreover, this 97

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

based services (e.g., Jung & Park, 2018). AR games have an emerging interesting phenomenon called game transfer (De Gortari, 2018; Dindar & de Gortari, 2017), which provides new business model for e-com­ merce managers. Specifically, future works could explore what we did not know before, i.e., how AR technologies create game transfer and how game transfer could enhance satisfaction of the three basic needs. Motivation can be intrinsic or extrinsic. The context of this study motivates us to focus on intrinsic ones. However, future works should decide whether it is suitable to include both intrinsic and extrinsic ones in their research contexts. For example, live streamers may possess both motivations to continue their broadcasting behaviour (Zhao, Chen, Cheng, & Wang, 2018). This study does not aim to review various need and motivation theories. We adopt the three basic human needs because of their wide applicability. However, this choice does not reduce the usefulness of other need and motivation theories. Future studies could adopt alter­ native theoretical views to examine this issue, thus deepening under­ standing of this issue. We use the three basic human needs and regard them as embracing all the needs. However, this approach prevents us from including unique needs that pertain to online games, e.g., presence (Johnson, Klarkowski, Vella, Phillips, McEwan & Watling, 2018), tension, and flow (Johnson, Gardner, & Perry, 2018). Future studies should explore how these unique needs can enlarge our knowledge on basic need categorization, and how they contribute to gamers’ self-worth and loyalty. Previous gaming studies have proposed that gamer loyalty can be predicted by enjoyment, flow (Chen & Sun, 2016; Ghazali, Mutum, & Woon, 2019; Su, Chiang, Lee, & Chang, 2016), immersion satisfaction (Teng, 2010), and involvement (Lin, Lee, & Lin, 2017; Tseng & Wang, 2013). These factors are frequently used in the literature, so future studies could explore how these factors would enrich our model, e.g., moderating the link between self-worth and loyalty.

approach is widely employed and thus should be regarded as acceptable in the pertinent literature (Ding & Lii, 2016; Hamari, Hanner, & Koi­ visto, 2017b). However, this approach is known for its limit in directly establishing causality among the study constructs. Therefore, future studies could replicate our study by using alternative approaches, e.g., longitudinal or experimental designs. Furthermore, to obtain further insights on online gamers’ experience, future research may use quali­ tative designs to explore online gamers’ experience, extending our findings. We conducted our study in Taiwan, limiting the impact of cultural differences on our model, which however presents a limitation. There­ fore, future studies could explore how cultural differences may moder­ ate the impact of autonomy need satisfaction, like Hagger, Chatzisarantis, Barkoukis, Wang, and Baranowski (2005). Alternatively, future studies could conduct cross-cultural comparisons, like Chen, Yen, Pronpriphet, and Widjaja (2015). We ask the participants to nominate one recently played game. This approach has the advantage of reducing the memory retrieval bias. Moreover, coverage of various game genres enhances the generaliz­ ability of the study findings. However, each game genre has its own unique features that can be evaluated with regard to need satisfaction. For example, first-person shooter games are featured by clans, so clanlife can be evaluated with regard to need satisfaction (Reer & Kr€ amer, 2018). Moreover, MMORPGs can be featured by social presence (Jin et al., 2017), so future works could explore how social presence could act as a moderator in the present research framework. To achieve our research purposes, following the pertinent literature (Coulson, Oskis, Meredith, & Gould, 2018; Mancini, Imperato, & Sibilla, 2019; Palomba, 2018; Wu et al., 2010), we only include gamers as participants. However, exclusion of non-gamers presents a limitation. Hence, future studies could explore why non-gamers resist playing games, offering further insights. Most participants in this study are male. The gender composition in the sample is consistent with those in recent online gaming studies (Bonny & Castaneda, 2017; Meng et al., 2015). However, this compo­ sition restrains us from exploring the gaming experience of female gamers. Hence, future research may aim to provide insights for online game providers to attract more female gamers. Specifically, female gamers may enjoy quizzes, puzzles, and board game genres (Lucas & Sherry, 2004). Future works could extract the elements of such game genres and attempt to use theories to conceptualize how they attract female gamers. Recent advances in information technologies have enabled the development of augmented reality (AR) games that are part of location-

7. Conclusion Our study is innovative in explaining how real-life need satisfaction impacts online gamer loyalty, offering novel insights for e-commerce managers to enhance user loyalty. We contribute to SAT by verifying that real-world need satisfaction would impact self-worth and thus the engagement in the gaming virtual world. This is what we did not know before. Future studies could replicate our work in social-oriented games and include social aspects, providing additional insights on the devel­ opment of virtual communities.

Appendix

Please assess whether you agree with the following items, as they describe your feelings. Construct

Item

Source

Loyalty

I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I

Teng (2018a)

Autonomy Need Satisfaction

Competence Need Satisfaction

Relatedness Need Satisfaction

intend to continually play this game in the future. predict that in the future I will continually play this game. intend to continue playing this game rather than discontinue. feel a sense of choice and freedom in the things I undertake. feel that my decisions reflect what I really want. feel my choices express who I really am. feel I have been doing what really interests me. feel confident that I can do things well. feel capable at what I do. feel competent to achieve my goals. feel I can successfully complete difficult tasks. feel that the people I care about also care about me. feel connected with people who care for me, and for whom I care. feel close and connected with other people who are important to me. experience a warm feeling with the people I spend time with.

Chen et al. (2015)

Chen et al. (2015)

Chen et al. (2015)

(continued on next page)

98

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100

(continued ) Construct

Item

Source

Self-worth

On the whole, I am satisfied with myself. I feel that I have a number of good qualities. I am able to do things as well as most other people. I feel that I’m a person of worth, at least on an equal plane with others. I take a positive attitude toward myself.

Rosenberg (1965)

Note. All the items have anchors: 1 denotes “strongly disagreeable”, 2 denotes “disagreeable”, 3 denotes “neutral”, 4 denotes “agreeable”, and 5 denotes “strongly agreeable”.

References

Hamari, J., Alha, K., J€ arvel€ a, S., Kivikangas, J. M., Koivisto, J., & Paavilainen, J. (2017). Why do players buy in-game content? An empirical study on concrete purchase motivations. Computers in Human Behavior, 68, 538–546. Hamari, J., Hanner, N., & Koivisto, J. (2017). Service quality explains why people use freemium services but not if they go premium: An empirical study in free-to-play games. International Journal of Information Management, 37(1), 1449–1459. Hamari, J., & Keronen, L. (2017). Why do people play games? A meta-analysis. International Journal of Information Management, 37(3), 125–141. Hamari, J., & Koivisto, J. (2015). Why do people use gamification services? International Journal of Information Management, 35(4), 419–431. Hamari, J., & Sj€ oblom, M. (2017). What is eSports and why do people watch it? Internet Research, 27(2), 211–232. Hassan, L., Dias, A., & Hamari, J. (2019). How motivational feedback increases user’s benefits and continued use: A study on gamification, quantified-self and social networks. International Journal of Information Management, 46, 151–162. Herodotou, C., Kambouri, M., & Winters, N. (2014). Dispelling the myth of the socioemotionally dissatisfied gamer. Computers in Human Behavior, 32, 23–31. Howell, J. L., & Shepperd, J. A. (2012). Reducing information avoidance through affirmation. Psychological Science, 23(2), 141–145. Huang, H.-C., Cheng, T. C. E., Huang, W.-F., & Teng, C.-I. (2018). Impact of online gamers’ personality traits on interdependence, network convergence, and continuance intention: Perspective of social exchange theory. International Journal of Information Management, 38(1), 232–242. Huang, H.-C., Cheng, T. C. E., Huang, W.-F., & Teng, C.-I. (2018). Who are likely to build strong online social networks? The perspectives of relational cohesion theory and personality theory. Computers in Human Behavior, 82, 111–123. Jin, W., Sun, Y., Wang, N., & Zhang, X. (2017). Why users purchase virtual products in MMORPG? An integrative perspective of social presence and user engagement. Internet Research, 27(2), 408–427. Johnson, D., Gardner, M. J., & Perry, R. (2018). Validation of two game experience scales: The player experience of need satisfaction (PENS) and game experience questionnaire (GEQ). International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 118, 38–46. Johnson, D., Gardner, J., & Sweetser, P. (2016). Motivations for videogame play: Predictors of time spent playing. Computers in Human Behavior, 63, 805–812. Johnson, D., Klarkowski, M., Vella, K., Phillips, C., McEwan, M., & Watling, C. N. (2018). Greater rewards in videogames lead to more presence, enjoyment and effort. Computers in Human Behavior, 87, 66–74. Jung, Y., & Park, J. (2018). An investigation of relationships among privacy concerns, affective responses, and coping behaviors in location-based services. International Journal of Information Management, 43, 15–24. Kamboj, S., Sarmah, B., Gupta, S., & Dwivedi, Y. (2018). Examining branding co-creation in brand communities on social media: Applying the paradigm of stimulus-organismresponse. International Journal of Information Management, 39, 169–185. Kaptein, M., Parvinen, P., & P€ oyry, E. (2015). The danger of engagement: Behavioral observations of online community activity and service spending in the online gaming context. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 20(1), 50–75. Karahanna, E., Xu, S. X., Xu, Y., & Zhang, N. A. (2018). The needs-affordances-features perspective for the use of social media. MIS Quarterly, 42(3), 737–756. Knowles, M. L., Lucas, G. M., Molden, D. C., Gardner, W. L., & Dean, K. K. (2010). There’s no substitute for belonging: Self-affirmation following social and nonsocial threats. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 36(2), 173–186. Kokkinakis, A. V., Lin, F., Pavlas, D., & Wade, A. R. (2016). What’s in a name? Ages and names predict the valence of social interactions in a massive online game. Computers in Human Behavior, 55, 605–613. Lee, D., Moon, J., Kim, Y. J., & Yi, M. Y. (2015). Antecedents and consequences of mobile phone usability: Linking simplicity and interactivity to satisfaction, trust, and brand loyalty. Information & Management, 52(3), 295–304. Li, K., Nguyen, H. V., Cheng, T. C. E., & Teng, C.-I. (2018). How do avatar characteristics affect avatar friendliness and online gamer loyalty? Perspective of the theory of embodied cognition. Internet Research, 28(4), 1103–1121. Liao, G.-Y., Huang, H.-C., & Teng, C.-I. (2016). When does frustration not reduce continuance intention of online gamers? The expectancy disconfirmation perspective. Journal of Electronic Commerce Research, 17(1), 65–79. Liao, G.-Y., & Teng, C.-I. (2017). You can make it: Expectancy for growth increases online gamer loyalty. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 21(3), 398–423. Lin, C.-Y., Hung, W.-H., Fang, K., & Tu, C.-C. (2015). Understanding players’ achievement values from MMORPGs: An exploratory study. Internet Research, 25(5), 829–851. Lin, Y.-C., Lee, Y.-C., & Lin, S.-Y. (2017). The influence of the personality traits of webcasters on online games. International Journal of Electronic Customer Relationship Management, 11(1), 94–103.

Akbari, E., Pilot, A., & Simons, P. R. J. (2015). Autonomy, competence, and relatedness in foreign language learning through Facebook. Computers in Human Behavior, 48, 126–134. Alha, K., Koskinen, E., Paavilainen, J., & Hamari, J. (2019). Why do people play locationbased augmented reality games: A study on pok�emon GO. Computers in Human Behavior, 93, 114–122. Baumeister, R. F., Campbell, J. D., Krueger, J. I., & Vohs, K. D. (2003). Does high selfesteem cause better performance, interpersonal success, happiness, or healthier lifestyles? Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 4(1), 1–44. Bonny, J. W., & Castaneda, L. M. (2017). Number processing ability is connected to longitudinal changes in multiplayer battle arena skill. Computers in Human Behavior, 66, 377–387. Calleja, G. (2010). Digital games and escapism. Games and Culture, 5(4), 335–353. Chen, K., Chen, J. V., & Ross, W. H. (2010). Antecedents of online game dependency: The implications of multimedia realism and uses and gratifications theory. Computers in Human Behavior, 21(2), 69–99. Cheng, H., & Furnham, A. (2004). Perceived parental rearing style, self-esteem and selfcriticism as predictors of happiness. Journal of Happiness Studies, 5(1), 1–21. Chen, L.-X., & Sun, C.-T. (2016). Self-regulation influence on game play flow state. Computers in Human Behavior, 54, 341–350. Chen, B., Vansteenkiste, M., Beyers, W., Boone, L., Deci, E. L., Van der Kaap-Deeder, J., … Ryan, R. M. (2015). Basic psychological need satisfaction, need frustration, and need strength across four cultures. Motivation and Emotion, 39(2), 216–236. Chen, J. V., Yen, D. C., Pornpriphet, W., & Widjaja, A. E. (2015). E-Commerce web site loyalty: A cross cultural comparison. Information Systems Frontiers, 17(6), 1283–1299. Chiniara, M., & Bentein, K. (2016). Linking servant leadership to individual performance: Differentiating the mediating role of autonomy, competence and relatedness need satisfaction. The Leadership Quarterly, 27(1), 124–141. Chiu, C.-M., Fang, Y.-H., & Wang, E. T. G. (2015). Building community citizenship behaviors: The relative role of attachment and satisfaction. Journal of the Association for Information Systems, 16(11), 947–979. Cohen, G. L., Sherman, D. K., Bastardi, A., Hsu, L., McGoey, M., & Ross, L. (2010). Bridging the partisan divide: Self-affirmation reduces ideological closed-mindedness and inflexibility in negotiation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93(3), 415–430. Cohen, J. (1992). A power primer. Psychological Bulletin, 112(1), 155–159. Coulson, M. C., Oskis, A., Meredith, J., & Gould, R. L. (2018). Attachment, attraction and communication in real and virtual worlds: A study of massively multiplayer online gamers. Computers in Human Behavior, 87, 49–57. De Gortari, A. B. O. (2018). Empirical study on game transfer phenomena in a locationbased augmented reality game. Telematics and Informatics, 35(2), 382–396. Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (2000). The “what” and “why” of goal pursuits: Human needs and the self-determination of behavior. Psychological Inquiry, 11(4), 227–268. DeWall, C. N., Maner, J. K., & Rouby, D. A. (2009). Social exclusion and early-stage interpersonal perception: Selective attention to signs of acceptance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 96(4), 729–741. Dindar, M., & de Gortari, A. B. O. (2017). Turkish validation of the game transfer phenomena scale (GTPS): Measuring altered perceptions, automatic mental processes and actions and behaviours associated with playing video games. Telematics and Informatics, 34(8), 1802–1813. Ding, M.-C., & Lii, Y.-S. (2016). Handling online service recovery: Effects of perceived justice on online games. Telematics and Informatics, 33(4), 881–895. Durcikova, A., Lee, A. S., & Brown, S. A. (2018). Making rigorous research relevant: Innovating statistical action research. MIS Quarterly, 42(1), 241–263. Fang, Y., Chiu, C., & Wang, E. T. G. (2011). Understanding customers’ satisfaction and repurchase intentions. Internet Research, 21(4), 479–503. Ghazali, E. M., Mutum, D. S., & Woon, M. Y. (2019). Multiple sequential mediation in an extended uses and gratifications model of augmented reality game Pok� emon GO. Internet Research, 29(3), 504–528. Hagger, M. S., Chatzisarantis, N. L. D., Barkoukis, V., Wang, C. K. J., & Baranowski, J. (2005). Perceived autonomy support in physical education and leisure-time physical activity. A cross-cultural evaluation of the trans-contextual model. Journal of Educational Psychology, 97(3), 376–390. Hamari, J. (2015). Why do people buy virtual goods? Attitude toward virtual good purchase versus game enjoyment. International Journal of Information Management, 35(3), 299–308.

99

G.-Y. Liao et al.

Computers in Human Behavior 103 (2020) 91–100 Steele, C. M. (1988). The psychology of self-affirmation: Sustaining the integrity of the self. In Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 21, pp. 261–302). Chicago, IL: Academic Press. Steele, C. M., Spencer, S. J., & Lynch, M. (1993). Self-image resilience and dissonance: The role of affirmational resources. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64 (6), 885–896. Stefanone, M. A., Lackaff, D., & Rosen, D. (2011). Contingencies of self-worth and socialnetworking-site behavior. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 14(1–2), 41–49. Su, Y.-S., Chiang, W.-L., Lee, C.-T. J., & Chang, H.-C. (2016). The effect of flow experience on player loyalty in mobile game application. Computers in Human Behavior, 63, 240–248. Tamborini, R., Bowman, N. D., Eden, A., Grizzard, M., & Organ, A. (2010). Defining media enjoyment as the satisfaction of intrinsic needs. Journal of Communication, 60 (4), 758–777. Teng, C.-I. (2010). Customization, immersion satisfaction, and online gamer loyalty. Computers in Human Behavior, 26(6), 1547–1554. Teng, C.-I. (2017). Strengthening loyalty of online gamers: Goal gradient perspective. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 21(1), 128–147. Teng, C.-I. (2017). Impact of avatar identification on online gamer loyalty: Perspectives of social identity and social capital theories. International Journal of Information Management, 37(6), 601–610. Teng, C.-I. (2018). Look to the future: Enhancing online gamer loyalty from the perspective of the theory of consumption values. Decision Support Systems, 114, 49–60. Teng, C.-I. (2018). Managing gamer relationships to enhance online gamer loyalty: The perspectives of social capital theory and self-perception theory. Computers in Human Behavior, 79, 59–67. Toma, C. L., & Hancock, J. T. (2013). Self-affirmation underlies Facebook use. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39(3), 321–331. Tseng, F.-C., Cheng, T. C. E., Li, K., & Teng, C.-I. (2017). How does media richness contribute to customer loyalty to mobile instant messaging? Internet Research, 27(3), 520–537. Tseng, F.-C., Huang, H.-C., & Teng, C.-I. (2015). How do online game communities retain gamers? Social presence and social capital perspectives. Journal of ComputerMediated Communication, 20(6), 601–614. Tseng, F.-C., Pham, T. T. L., Cheng, T. C. E., & Teng, C.-I. (2018). Enhancing customer loyalty to mobile instant messaging: Perspectives of network effect and selfdetermination theories. Telematics and Informatics, 35(5), 1133–1143. Tseng, F.-M., & Wang, C.-Y. (2013). Why do not satisfied consumers show reuse behavior? The context of online games. Computers in Human Behavior, 29(3), 1012–1022. Vashisht, D., & Sreejesh, S. (2017). Effect of nature of the game on ad-persuasion in online gaming context. Internet Research, 27(1), 52–73. Velez, J. A., & Hanus, M. D. (2016). Self-affirmation theory and performance feedback: When scoring high makes you feel low. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 19(12), 721–726. Warmelink, H., Harteveld, C., & Mayer, I. (2009). Press enter or escape to play: Deconstructing escapism in multiplayer gaming. In Proceedings of DiGRA 2009. Wu, J.-H., Wang, S.-C., & Tsai, H.-H. (2010). Falling in love with online games: The uses and gratifications perspective. Computers in Human Behavior, 26(6), 1862–1871. Wu, Y., Cui, T., Liu, N., Deng, Y., & Guo, J. (2018). Demystifying continuous participation in game applications at social networking sites: A social playfulness design perspective. Internet Research, 28(2), 374–392. Yoo, C. W., Sanders, G. L., & Moon, J. (2013). Exploring the effect of e-WOM participation on e-loyalty in e-commerce. Decision Support Systems, 55(3), 669–678. Yoon, C., & Rolland, E. (2012). Knowledge-sharing in virtual communities: Familiarity, anonymity and self-determination theory. Behaviour & Information Technology, 31 (11), 1133–1143. Zhang, T., Wang, W. Y. C., Lin, Y. C., & Tai, L.-H. (2015). Understanding user motivation for evaluating online content: A self-determination theory perspective. Behaviour & Information Technology, 34(5), 479–491. Zhao, Q., Chen, C.-D., Cheng, H.-W., & Wang, J.-L. (2018). Determinants of live streamers’ continuance broadcasting intentions on twitch: A self-determination theory perspective. Telematics and Informatics, 35(2), 406–420. Zheng, X., Lee, M., & Cheung, C. M. K. (2017). Examining e-loyalty towards online shopping platforms: The role of coupon proneness and value consciousness. Internet Research, 27(3), 709–726.

Longworth, C., Deakins, J., Rose, D., & Gracey, F. (2016). The nature of self-esteem and its relationship to anxiety and depression in adult acquired brain injury. Neuropsychological Rehabilitation, 28(7), 1078–1094. Lucas, K., & Sherry, J. L. (2004). Sex differences in video game play: A communicationbased explanation. Communication Research, 31(5), 499–523. Luo, M. M., & Chea, S. (2018). Cognitive appraisal of incident handling, affects, and postadoption behaviors: A test of affective events theory. International Journal of Information Management, 40, 120–131. Macey, J., & Hamari, J. (2018). Investigating relationships between video gaming, spectating esports, and gambling. Computers in Human Behavior, 80, 344–353. Mancini, T., Imperato, C., & Sibilla, F. (2019). Does avatar’s character and emotional bond expose to gaming addiction? Two studies on virtual self-discrepancy, avatar identification and gaming addiction in massively multiplayer online role-playing game players. Computers in Human Behavior, 92, 297–305. Meng, J., Williams, D., & Shen, C. (2015). Channels matter: Multimodal connectedness, types of co-players and social capital for multiplayer online battle arena gamers. Computers in Human Behavior, 52, 190–199. Merhi, M. I. (2016). Towards a framework for online game adoption. Computers in Human Behavior, 60, 253–263. Moon, J., Hossain, M. D., Sanders, G. L., Garrity, E. J., & Jo, S. (2013). Player commitment to massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs): An integrated model. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 17(4), 7–38. NewZoo. (2019). Mobile revenues account for more than 50% of the global games market as it reaches 137.9 billion in 2018. Retrieved from https://newzoo.com/insi ghts/articles/global-games-market-reaches-137-9-billion-in-2018-mobile-games-t ake-half/. (Accessed 16 August 2019). Onwuegbuzie, A. J., & Daley, C. E. (1998). Study skills of undergraduates as a function of academic locus of control, self-perception, and social interdependence. Psychological Reports, 83(2), 595–598. Palomba, A. (2018). Virtual perceived emotional intelligence: How high brand loyalty video game players evaluate their own video game play experiences to repair or regulate emotions. Computers in Human Behavior, 85, 34–42. Pe-Than, E. P. P., Goh, D. H. L., & Lee, C. S. (2014). Making work fun: Investigating antecedents of perceived enjoyment in human computation games for information sharing. Computers in Human Behavior, 39, 88–99. Pee, L. G., Jiang, J., & Klein, G. (2018). Signaling effect of website usability on repurchase intention. International Journal of Information Management, 39, 228–241. Plariumcom. (2017). Trends in online gaming in 2017 and beyond. Retrieved from https://plarium.com/en/mmo-games/trends-online-gaming-2017/. (Accessed 16 August 2019). Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., Lee, J.-Y., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2003). Common method biases in behavioral research: A critical review of the literature and recommended remedies. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(5), 879–903. Pruessner, J. C., Baldwin, M. W., Dedovic, K., Renwick, R., Mahani, N. K., Lord, C., … Lupien, S. (2005). Self-esteem, locus of control, hippocampal volume, and cortisol regulation in young and old adulthood. NeuroImage, 28(4), 815–826. Reer, F., & Kr€ amer, N. C. (2018). Psychological need satisfaction and well-being in firstperson shooter clans: Investigating underlying factors. Computers in Human Behavior, 84, 383–391. Rezvani, A., Khosravi, P., & Dong, L. (2017). Motivating users toward continued usage of information systems: Self-determination theory perspective. Computers in Human Behavior, 76, 263–275. Rosenberg, M. (1965). Society and the adolescent self-image. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2000). Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being. American Psychologist, 55 (1), 68–78. Shareef, M. A., Dwivedi, Y. K., Kumar, V., & Kumar, U. (2017). Content design of advertisement for consumer exposure: Mobile marketing through short messaging service. International Journal of Information Management, 37(4), 257–268. Shen, C.-X., Liu, R.-D., & Wang, D. (2013). Why are children attracted to the internet? The role of need satisfaction perceived online and perceived in daily real life. Computers in Human Behavior, 29(1), 185–192. Sherman, D. K., & Cohen, G. L. (2006). The psychology of self-defense: Self-affirmation theory. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 183–242. Shi, S. W., Xia, M., & Huang, Y. (2015). From minnows to whales: An empirical study of purchase behavior in freemium social games. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 20(2), 177–207. Sj€ oblom, M., T€ orh€ onena, M., Hamari, J., & Macey, J. (2019). The ingredients of Twitch streaming: Affordances of game streams. Computers in Human Behavior, 92, 20–28.

100