Investigating male gamers' behavioral intention to play PUBG: Insights from playful-consumption experiences

Umair Rehman; Muhammad Umair Shah; Amir Zaib Abbasi; Helmut Hlavacs; Rameen Iftikhar

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.909875

Investigating male gamers' behavioral intention to play PUBG: Insights from playful-consumption experiences

Front Psychol. 2022 Aug 18:13:909875. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.909875. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Umair Rehman¹, Muhammad Umair Shah², Amir Zaib Abbasi³, Helmut Hlavacs⁴, Rameen Iftikhar⁵

Affiliations

¹ User Experience Design, Wilfrid Laurier University, Brantford, ON, Canada.
² University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada.
³ IRC for Finance and Digital Economy, KFUPM Business School, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia.
⁴ University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria.
⁵ Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore, Pakistan.

Abstract

This research investigates the factors that affect male gamers' behavioral intention to play PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG), which is one of the most widely played online games of today's era. We examine the factors through the lens of the hedonic consumption model (i.e., playful-consumption experiences) and use the gratification theory to predict behavioral intention to play PUBG. Data from 248 male PUBG gamers were analyzed using PLS-SEM analyses. The study involved an initial stage where an estimation model (i.e., measurement model) was analyzed to assess the constructs' reliability and validity. Following this, the second stage involved assessing the theoretical model to test the relationship between the principle constructs. The study found that playful-consumption experience factors, such as escapism, emotional involvement, sensory experience, enjoyment, and arousal, significantly influenced the behavioral intentions to play PUBG. The research findings further indicate that role-projection and fantasy failed to impact consumers' intention to play PUBG. This study provides both theoretical and practical implications. It fills the literature gap by focusing on predicting the behavioral intention to play PUBG through the playful-consumption experiences of a popular online multiplayer game. Practically, this study could potentially open avenues for gaming companies to address how different playful-consumption experiences impact game users' behavioral intentions.

Keywords: Battle Royal games; entertainment computing; gaming; hedonic consumption experience; playful-consumption experiences; uses and gratifications theory.