Context, Community, and the Individual: Modeling Identity in a Game Affinity Space.

TRANSFORMATIVE learning; FLIGHT simulators; SOCIAL networks; DOWNLOADING; SPACE flight

Video games, and the affinity spaces that develop around them, have been lauded as valuable sites for promoting learning as a transformational and intentional process of identity exploration. This research examines how such processes are enacted on a community discussion forum for the space flight simulator game Kerbal Space Program. Public longitudinal data was downloaded from a social network of active forum posters, which was coded for identity exploration constructs as defined by the Projective Reflection theoretical framework. Coding informed the development of two case studies selected to illustrate how identity exploration manifested in two central members of the social network. Findings offer insights into how learning as identity exploration is enacted in game community forums and affinity spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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