POKÉMON GO THESIS
A Study of AUGMENTED Reality Gaming and Social Connectivity
SUMMARY
This summer, I saw something remarkable: a social phenomenon known as Pokémon GO. Although not the first augmented reality app, Pokémon GO changed how users and non-users saw the world. I questioned why were people falling off cliffs in my hometown, why did people congregate until late into the night at spots like Balboa Park in San Diego or in Yoyogi Park in Tokyo, and why did this game go from zero to sixty in less than a week, and persist at the same level for over two months. Inspired by this game, I focused my thesis on Pokémon GO and social connectivity. During the next 25 weeks, I defined my research question, collected qualitative interviews from active Pokémon GO users, and summarized my findings.
SCOPE
Role: Principal Investigator
Date: July 2016 - March 2017
Skills: Defining Research Question, Literature Research, Interviewing, Data Analysis
Tools: Google Docs, Voice Memos
Deliverable: 45-page Written Thesis and Conference Presentation
PROCESS
DEFINING THE QUESTIONs
After reading hundreds of pages about social connectivity and the rise of technology, I found a part of Pokémon GO that I can hypothesize and dissect. Most of the literature argues that the rise of mobile technology has created a disconnect between people even if they can contact each other through Skype and Facebook. I argue that my findings will prove that, due to Pokemon GO's novel approach to augmented reality, users felt more connected to other users. To accomplish this goal, I needed to answer these three questions:
1. Does the nature of Pokémon GO's social interaction create a community for its users to develop social ties across a spectrum of durability?
2. Did Pokémon GO players create long-lasting social ties through playing the Augmented Reality game?
3. Do the three teams from Pokémon GO (Mystic, Instinct, and Valor) create positive social impact through gaining group social capital? Additionally, do the groups create inter-group discrimination and/or stereotypes
INTERVIEWING POKÉMON GO USERS
Over the course of three weeks, I interviewed 13 participants that were all active Pokemon GO users. A majority of the users also played during the summer. Each interview was between 15 and 30 minutes. I struggled with finding male users that didn't work on the university campus; however, I was able to snowball sample off some participants to find two more users that fit this demographic. Although this is a small group of users, I believe these participants are diverse across age, gender and occupation to find significant results that could be generalized to the greater population.
Participant Age
Participant Gender
Participant Occupation
SUMMARIZED FINDINGS
Finding 1
Coworkers in an office on campus played a lot during lunch breaks. Half of the office felt they had become closer because of the game. Even though walking at lunch wasn't a new activity to them, it gave them something to do and talk about. They even started texting outside of work about the game. One of them went to Italy over winter break and the other three gave their gmail accounts to her so she could sign in and catch the European-specific Pokemon. This level of trust between the coworkers was unprecedented.
Finding 2
Additionally, this user would drive around with these friends for hours at night to go find gyms and other Pokémon. This user is the user I was hoping to find: the Pokémon GO players who not only met strangers, but exchanged contact information to further widen their social connectivity.
Finding 3
Students didn't meet people as much because they only played with the friends they already had. Some of them would meet random people whilst playing but never exchanged contact information with the strangers. They did admit that they would be more willing to talk to the strangers playing the game. One male student said he noticed two strangers looked confused and, assuming they were players, he gave them advice on where he saw a nearby pokemon.
Finding 4
Even though most of the people I interviewed did not care about the team affiliation, they knew of the team the stereotypes. According to the participants, Valor (red) were people who were really aggressive and heavily invested in the game, Mystic (blue) were people who were chill but also invested in the game, and Instinct (yellow) were people who were terrible and not invested with the game. Some participants would say they didn’t partake in the team discrimination, but then would go on to say that yellow were terrible and non-invested in the game. One participant said that yellow and red have joined together in Irvine to take down the reigning blue. Pokemon GO’s teams organize its players into separate identities, and these identities have created stereotypes, which leads to discrimination in real life.
Finding 5
A marker helps researcher define a person’s identity based off of physical traits. During the summer, Pokemon GO became a marker. It’s physical behavior, whether the swiping of throwing a PokeBall or in a massive group of people, became a way for other people, fellow players and non-players, to know if they play the game. This allowed for an observer to know something about them besides race, gender, and age. This could produce judgement, whether liking them and helping them or judging them.
IMPACT
My findings thus far are able to show the sociology sphere of academics that not all technology has created a divide between people. The results above show that depending on circumstances and who the person is, the game was able to facilitate users to deepen their relationships, broaden their relationships, and create teams where users hold pride and scrutinize other teams (even if they don't think they are). Pokémon GO was the trend in the 2016 summer, and it has changed the way we, as a society, are able to think about mobile technology and social connectivity. Although it's fan base has diminished since the summer of 2016, it clearly has affected people's lives in an overall positive manner.