The effect of prosocial video games on individual altruism: the role of avatar appearance and gender

A virtual avatar serves as a video game player’s self-presentation in the virtual space. The relation between avatar appearance and aggression has been substantially confirmed, but there are open questions about the relation between avatar appearance and individual altruism, as well as game prosociality and player’s gender on individual altruism and avatar identification. Employing a cue-priming paradigm, this study delved into the effects of avatar appearance, game prosociality and player’s gender on avatar identification and altruism, as well as the relationship between avatar identification and altruism. The results showed that (1) The relationship between avatar appearance and altruism were influenced by the prosociality of games. In the prosocial story task, the justice avatar elicited significantly higher altruism than the neutral avatar. (2) In the prosocial story task, the effect of avatar appearance on male altruistic behavior was more pronounced than that of female. (3) There was a significant positively correlation between avatar identification and altruism, which was moderated by the prosociality of games.