Of princesses, paladins, and player motivations: Gender stereotypes and gendered perceptions in video games

Video games have been labeled a male space, and playing video games an activity created by men and for men (Fox & Tang, 2014; see also Lange & Schwab, this volume). The present chapter analyses the typical roles of male and female video game characters, their presentation in games, their effects, and how players perceive these characters. To this end, gender in video games will be analyzed on different levels. Although women and men share the same overall interest in playing video games as a medium for entertainment, they differ substantially with regard to genres and game titles they prefer. These gender differences have been attributed to the overrepresentation of male characters in video games, uninviting game contents that strongly rely on competition and physical aggression, and the stereotypical portrayal and scripted behavioral patterns of hyper-masculine or “macho” male and sexualized female game characters. The issue of gender portrayals in video games will be discussed in the light of theoretical considerations on evolved dispositions that differ by sex versus the social structural account that attributes sex differences to the differing placement of women and men in the social structure. It will be argued that both theoretical approaches make similar predictions regarding gender-specific video game preferences

Who’s afraid of Donkey Kong? Testing the Stereotype Threat Effect in Video Gaming

In two studies (Study 1: N = 130; Study 2: N = 56) participants played a video game (Bejeweled 3; SkyChasers) and were either confronted with a stereotype threat (ST) or not. ST is defined as the risk of confirming a negative stereotype about one’s own group and has been investigated in various field, i.a. in gaming. In the first study participants were confronted with the stereotype that women would perform worse in video games than men. In the second study we worked with a reversed stereotype, namely that women would have now outpaced males in some genres of video games. Our results show that performance varies across gender and genre. Although we did not find the hypothesized interaction effect of gender and ST condition in performance, self-reported measures, such as perceived frustration, and moderating variables indicate performance differences both for women and men, but on different psychological dimensions

Quantum Circuit Compiler for a Shuttling-Based Trapped-Ion Quantum Computer

The increasing capabilities of quantum computing hardware and the challenge of realizing deep quantum circuits require fully automated and efficient tools for compiling quantum circuits. To express arbitrary circuits in a sequence of native gates specific to the quantum computer architecture, it is necessary to make algorithms portable across the landscape of quantum hardware providers. In this work, we present a compiler capable of transforming and optimizing a quantum circuit targeting a shuttling-based trapped-ion quantum processor. It consists of custom algorithms set on top of the quantum circuit framework Pytket. The performance was evaluated for a wide range of quantum circuits and the results show that the gate counts can be reduced by factors up to 5.1 compared to standard Pytket and up to 2.2 compared to standard Qiskit compilation.Comment: 35 pages, 25 figures, 4 tables, accepted in Quantu

A functional yeast survival screen of tumor-derived cDNA libraries designed to identify anti-apoptotic mammalian oncogenes

Yeast cells can be killed upon expression of pro-apoptotic mammalian proteins. We have established a functional yeast survival screen that was used to isolate novel human anti-apoptotic genes overexpressed in treatment-resistant tumors. The screening of three different cDNA libraries prepared from metastatic melanoma, glioblastomas and leukemic blasts allowed for the identification of many yeast cell death-repressing cDNAs, including 28% of genes that are already known to inhibit apoptosis, 35% of genes upregulated in at least one tumor entity and 16% of genes described as both anti-apoptotic in function and upregulated in tumors. These results confirm the great potential of this screening tool to identify novel anti-apoptotic and tumor-relevant molecules. Three of the isolated candidate genes were further analyzed regarding their anti-apoptotic function in cell culture and their potential as a therapeutic target for molecular therapy. PAICS, an enzyme required for de novo purine biosynthesis, the long non-coding RNA MALAT1 and the MAST2 kinase are overexpressed in certain tumor entities and capable of suppressing apoptosis in human cells. Using a subcutaneous xenograft mouse model, we also demonstrated that glioblastoma tumor growth requires MAST2 expression. An additional advantage of the yeast survival screen is its universal applicability. By using various inducible pro-apoptotic killer proteins and screening the appropriate cDNA library prepared from normal or pathologic tissue of interest, the survival screen can be used to identify apoptosis inhibitors in many different systems

Play the grief away – Positive effects of playing a meaningful video game

peer reviewedVideo games have become an integral part of society and have shown to have positive effects on mood (Russoniello et al., 2009), emotions and emotion regulation (Villani et al., 2018), depressive symptoms (Kowal et al., 2021), and general well-being (Granic et al., 2014). Also, prior research has shown potential positive effects on mood improvement for casual video games (e.g., Rieger et al., 2015; Russoniello et al., 2009). Therefore, the current lab study was conducted to test the effects on people’s affective state in the context of a meaningful video game (Gris) that deals with self-growth and healing after a traumatic event. It was hypothesized that playing the game leads to both mood improvement (i.e., reduced negative affect and increased positive affect in the pre-post PANAS [Watson et al., 1988]) as well as increased parasympathetic activity that indicates greater physiological relaxation (i.e., increased heart rate variability – HRV). Due to its immersive nature and its strong emotional themes, it was furthermore hypothesized that the extent of players’ reported pre-test depressive symptoms moderate the positive effects on mood (García Catalán et al., 2021; Vasilikaris, 2022). During the experiment, participants (N = 64) provided demographic information and answered their current affective state via PANAS before playing Gris for 20 minutes. Right after gameplay, participants rated the PANAS items again. HRV (indices: the root mean square of successive differences, high-frequency power [RMSSD], and the ratio between low-frequency [LF/HF] and high-frequency power [HF]) was assessed pre, during, and after gameplay. The results of the current study will be presented at the conference. The findings not only extend the general evidence base on the potentially beneficial role of video games and human-computer interaction, but in particular may illustrate the positive effects of meaningful video games on mental health and well-being