Catching more than pocket monsters: Pokémon Go's social and psychological effects on players

ABSTRACT

The augmented reality mobile game Pokémon Go has reached unprecedented popularity since its release in 2016. The game has received intense media attention, but scientific inquiry into its popularity and the effects of play are in the early stages. Previous work has used secondary data or simple correlational analysis to draw early conclusions. A seven-day diary study was conducted to investigate potential health, psychological, and social outcomes of daily gameplay. Daily time spent playing Pokémon Go was related to higher scores of life satisfaction, vitality, and greater social interactions and conversation with both friends and strangers, but not with increased daily exercise. Increased total gameplay across the week was associated with increased interaction and conversations along with more exercise. Future directions for this unique type of game along with the need for theoretical development for unique style of games are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Augmented reality
• Pokémon Go
• videogames
• life satisfaction
• social interactions

Data-availability

The data described in this article are openly available in the Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/dkrmw/

Open Scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open science badges for Open Data and Open Materials through Open Practices Disclosure. The data and materials are openly accessible at https://osf.io/dkrmw/

Notes

1. Additional variables. In addition to the variables analyzed for the current study, the initial survey and the final survey also included additional measures of personality, activity, and psychological variables. A list of these measures can be found in the supplemental materials at the following link https://osf.io/dkrmw/.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Patrick J. Ewell

Patrick J. Ewell, PhD., has been an assistant professor of psychology at Kenyon College since 2015. He earned his doctorate in social psychology at the University of Alabama in 2015. His research interests include both positive and negative effects of videogame play; theoretical aggression models, and the role of ostracism in social networking.

Michelle C. Quist

Michelle C. Quist is a teaching professor at Penn State University. She primarily does research on motivation and video games, with current projects focusing on authenticity and goal setting.

Camilla S. Øverup

Camilla S. Øverup is a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. She primarily does research on romantic relationships, with current projects focusing on adjustment after divorce, sensory loss among elderly individuals, and intimate partner violence.

Heather Watkins

Heather Watkins is a graduate student at Clemson University. She is working with Dr. Richard Pak to understand the psychological factors of how individuals interact with autonomous technology.

Rosanna E. Guadagno

Rosanna E. Guadagno is the Director of the Information Warfare Working Group at the Center for International Security and Cooperation, Stanford University. Her research examines the impact of technology on gender roles and social influence processes.