WoW Learning

By day, Michelle A. Hoyle is a respectable Open University course author and Ph.D. student at the University of Sussex. At night, she assumes her secret identity: Elsheindra, night elf guild mistress of The One on the EU-Thunderhorn World of Warcraft (WoW) server. Popular perception is that massively multiple online role-playing games (MMORPGs), like WoW, are just for kids. In fact, only about 20% of WoW players are between the ages of 12 to 19. Some 80% of players are people we around us: our next-door neighbours, local store owners, or even our teachers. What is it that compels people to spend between 20 to 24 hours a week in WoW? People’s motivations vary, but one thing is clear: while they are playing, they are learning.

Where does the learning come from? Learning is everywhere in the game. In order to contribute to a team effectively, people need to learn to play their characters well. Each character has specific abilities and learning to play well requires a substantial time investment. Other people are interested in more effectively killing things and devote hours outside of the game to reading about their character’s role and how to improve on it, often in very tiny increments. Forum discussions abound about the best equipment for particular classes and models are constructed of how gear will perform under certain conditions.

This ongoing research project is gathering data about the learning and motivations demonstrated by players of World of Warcraft, both in game and on forums. I am investigating how different groups of people come together to form communities of practice and how those communities support learning that has real-world benefits.

This project and associated research around it will form the basis of my Ph.D. at The University of Sussex under the supervision of Dr. Judith Good. I am a long-time member of the IDEAs Lab in the Department of Informatics at Sussex as well as a course author/course chair and associate lecturer at the The Open University.