{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,10]],"date-time":"2026-03-10T05:05:16Z","timestamp":1773119116168,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":28,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,4,14]],"date-time":"2020-04-14T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1586822400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":366,"URL":"http:\/\/www.sagepub.com\/licence-information-for-chorus"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/100000185","name":"Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","award":["D16AP00115"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["D16AP00115"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/100000185","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"crossref"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":["journals.sagepub.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Games and Culture"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2020,1]]},"abstract":"<jats:p> In this work, we analyze what effect streaming gameplay on Twitch has on players\u2019 in-game behavior and performance. We hypothesized that streaming can act as a form of implicit incentive to boost players\u2019 performance and engagement. To test this hypothesis, we continuously collected data about all Twitch streams related to a popular Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA) game, League of Legends (LoL), and data of all LoL matches played during the same time frame, and cross-mapped the two data sets. We found that, counterintuitively, streaming significantly deteriorates players\u2019 in-game performance: This may be due to the burden of carrying out two cognitively intensive activities at the same time, namely, playing the game and producing its commentary for streaming purposes. On the other hand, streaming increases engagement keeping players in significantly longer game sessions. We investigate these two effects further, to characterize how they vary upon individual characteristics. <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/1555412019838095","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,4,15]],"date-time":"2019-04-15T06:04:12Z","timestamp":1555308252000},"page":"9-31","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":36,"title":["Does Streaming Esports Affect Players\u2019 Behavior and Performance?"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"15","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-3953-378X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Akira","family":"Matsui","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Information Sciences Institute, University of Southern California, Marina del Rey, CA, USA"},{"name":"Department of Computer Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA"}]},{"given":"Anna","family":"Sapienza","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Information Sciences Institute, University of Southern California, Marina del Rey, CA, USA"}]},{"given":"Emilio","family":"Ferrara","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Information Sciences Institute, University of Southern California, Marina del Rey, CA, USA"},{"name":"Department of Computer Science, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,4,14]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.1706530115"},{"key":"bibr2-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.1802407115"},{"key":"bibr3-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.brainresrev.2008.07.001"},{"key":"bibr4-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.neubiorev.2012.10.003"},{"key":"bibr5-1555412019838095","first-page":"520","volume-title":"Proceedings of the Eleventh International AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media (ICWSM 2017), Montr\u00e9al, Qu\u00e9bec, Canada, 15\u201318 May 2017","author":"Ferrara E.","year":"2017"},{"key":"bibr6-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1145\/2736277.2741117"},{"key":"bibr7-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1108\/IntR-04-2016-0085"},{"key":"bibr8-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Hamilton W. A., Garretson O., Kerne A. (2014). Streaming on twitch: Fostering participatory communities of play within live mixed media. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1315\u20131324). Retrieved from http:\/\/dl.acm.org\/citation.cfm?id=2557048 doi:10.1145\/2556288.2557048","DOI":"10.1145\/2556288.2557048"},{"key":"bibr9-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1037\/1076-898X.10.3.188"},{"key":"bibr10-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.chb.2018.02.013"},{"key":"bibr11-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.chb.2017.06.006"},{"key":"bibr12-1555412019838095","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Kaytoue M., Silva A., Cerf L. (2012). Watch me playing, I am a professional: A first study on video game live streaming. In Proceedings of the 21st International Conference Companion on World Wide Web (pp. 1181\u20131188). 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