Welcome to esports, you suck: understanding new consumer socialisation within a toxic consumption collective

ABSTRACT

Consumption collectives manage conflict in various ways and socialise new consumers to ensure they participate in an appropriate manner. However, less is known about the new consumer experience within a conflict-ridden collective – particularly conflict arising from chronic and intensified anti-social practices. This study adopts a practice theory approach that combines interviews and netnography within the context of esports. Findings show a network of four practices that shape new consumer socialisation within a toxic consumption collective: learning, smurfing, scaffolding, and indoctrinating. While the practices of learning and scaffolding align new consumers into the required competencies of the collective, new consumers become embedded into a culture of negativity through the practices of smurfing and indoctrinating, through which toxicity becomes routinised. Overall, this network of practices shapes new consumer socialisation within online consumption collectives in both constructive and destructive ways.

KEYWORDS:

• Esports
• gaming
• consumption collectives
• consumer culture theory
• qualitative

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the Monash Business Behavioural Lab for their assistance with participant recruitment.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Clarice Yi Huston

Clarice Huston completed her PhD at Monash University in 2022. Her research interests include esports, consumption communities, and consumer culture. In her spare time, Clarice enjoys playing her favourite video games and trawling discussion forums for interesting stories.

Angela Gracia B. Cruz

Angela Gracia B. Cruz is a Senior Lecturer in Marketing at Monash University. Her research is focused on theories of consumption, marketing communication, and branding at the boundaries of markets – referring to liminal market spaces where complexities, ambivalences, and transformations abound. Angela frequently draws on cross-disciplinary, critical, and poststructuralist modes of theorizing.

Eloise Zoppos

Eloise Zoppos is the Research & Engagement Director at the Australian Consumer and Retail Studies unit in the Department of Marketing at Monash University. She specialises in retail and consumer behaviour research, using applied marketing and psychology research to deliver insights and strategic solutions to clients across retail and service-based industries.