How online gamersxe2x80x99 participation fosters their team commitment: Perspective of social identity theory Abstract   Online games are highly popular applications. While online gamers actively participate in gaming teams, no study has yet explored whether gamers have sufficient teamwork knowledge and have accumulated sufficient team participation experience. These likely strengthen team commitment, but we do not know, indicating a research gap. Research filling this gap could shed light on useful means for enhancing gamersxe2x80x99 team commitment. Grounded in social identity theory, we theorize the mechanism that links gamersxe2x80x99 overall gaming team participation experience and overall gaming teamwork knowledge to their team commitment. We collect twowave data from 344 online gamers that have played massively multiplayer online roleplaying games (MMORPGs) and use structural equation modelling for data analysis. We find that overall team participation experience is positively related to gaming team identification, while overall teamwork knowledge is positively related to compliance with gaming team norms. Both team identification and norm compliance are positively related to gaming team commitment. This study is the first to clarify the mechanism underlying the impacts of overall gaming team participation experience and overall gaming teamwork knowledge on gamersxe2x80x99 team commitment. Our findings provide the practical insight that game designers should incorporate game features that require or reward gamersxe2x80x99 participation in gaming teams or enhance gaming teamwork knowledge, thus strengthening gamersxe2x80x99 team commitment.

Exploring Followers Intention of Donating Online Game Streamers Online game livestreaming is an emerging industry. Followersu0027 donation is major source of live streamersu0027 income. The reactions induced by the immediacy and interactivity of online game livestreaming are critical to viewersu0027 engrossment in such livestreams. This study explores viewersu0027 intention of following and donation toward streamers of online game livestreams, by considering characteristics of the livestreaming context, streamers, as well as viewersu0027 feelings and perceptions. Results from analyzing data collected by online survey show that the relationship among loyalty, intention to follow, and intention to donate is significant. Value cocreation and flow experience are the main factors promoting viewersu0027 loyalty. Enjoyment indirectly affects loyalty through the flow experience. The influence of user engagement, media richness, social interaction, and expertise on value cocreation and flow experience is as our expectation. But social interaction and expertise are not as important to viewers. Academic and practical implications are discussed further.