Rhetorical Analysis

By Mohammed Islam

City College of New York

Instructor: Susan Delamara

May 14th, 2023

Author’s Note

This paper was prepared for English 21007 taught by Professor Susan Delamare. Questions concerning this paper should be addressed to: Mohammed Islam

Contact: [email protected]

Rhetorical Analysis of a Video Game Study

Video games are a fundamental part of my everyday life ever since I could figure out how technology worked. Throughout my day, I would play a variety of different games, online and offline, that required different amounts of time, effort, and especially intensity. For example, if I were to take on a word hunt, there would be no drive for me to put effort into finishing it because I see it as a calm and simple game that has no reason to be taken so seriously. The paper (2023) goes into this topic. The goal of the rhetorical essay is to understand the use of rhetorical appeals in the article in order to understand how the writers of the article present the arguments and findings to the reader so that the reader understands the strengths and weaknesses of the study. The rhetorical analysis helps the reader to understand the complexity of the research process and the importance of communication in the field of scholarly writing. This will help the reader to understand and appreciate video game research better.

Based on the wording and content of the article, the primary audience for this research is likely to be academic researchers and scholars in the field of video game research. The terminology used in the article is professional, technical and focuses on research methods, results and interpretation. For example, they used the game Icy Tower, detailing how the game’s physics, control responsiveness, and enemy behavior changed, and used jargon to show how to test the theory. The study itself was designed as an exploratory test of motivation intensity theory (MIT) in the context of video games, with the authors using a systematic approach to measure player engagement and difficulty. Additionally, this study focuses on the relationship between game difficulty and player participation, which has important implications for understanding consumer behavior in the video game industry, since the article states that theory is being applied to “consumers of media (including gamers) are active, goal-oriented, conscious users who, [are] guided by their own judgment” (p.2, 2023) . Therefore, from the wording, research methodology, and place of publication of this article, the primary audience for this article is academic researchers and scholars in the field of video game research, with a particular focus on consumer behavior in the video game industry.

The article was written by Paweł Strojny, Agnieszka Strojny, and Krzysztof Rębilas. Paweł Strojny and Agnieszka Strojny are both affiliated with the Faculty of Management and Social Communication Institute of Applied Psychology, Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Kraków, Poland . Krzysztof Rębilas is affiliated with the Doctoral School in the Social Sciences, Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Kraków, Poland. Overall, the authors of this article are all experienced researchers with expertise in a variety of fields related to consumer behavior and psychology. Their affiliations with respected universities and research institutes suggest that they are highly regarded within their respective fields.

The urgency or necessity that drives the research in this article is that the authors were motivated by their desire to contribute to the increase in research on video games and their impact on gamer motivation and engagement. This article suggests that the authors were interested in investigating the suitability of a particular research approach (the motivation intensity approach) for video game research. They are driven by a desire to identify new ways to study video game play and its impact on gamers. Furthermore, the fact that they conducted research (rather than simply speculating or reviewing existing literature) demonstrates a desire to generate new knowledge about video game play and its effects. The authors may have been motivated by a desire to contribute to this area of research by examining the applicability of theoretical frameworks used in other contexts. This is where they use the CARS model to create a research space. First, they established the situation by mentioning that even though the Motivational Intensity Theory has been used in many fields of study, it has been lacking in research when it comes to video games. Secondly, they raise questions on the problem such as “What factors cause the momentary level of willingness to play?” (p.6, 2023), which addresses the issue that there are gaps in the research being done, and indicates that this is why the study is being conducted. Finally, they conclude the model by presenting their own research and findings to close said gap. By testing the suitability of the motivation intensity approach to video game research, they hoped to provide a new way to study the relationship between motivation, difficulty, and player engagement.

The article follows an IMRAD structure. The introduction outlines the research question and hypothesis, as well as the purpose and significance of the study by explaining that MIT has been applied to many areas and their purpose was to see how it went in the video game field. The methods section describes the study design, participants, and procedures used to conduct the research. The results section reports on the relationships between player involvement, difficulty, and demographic variables such as age and gender. The discussion section provides an interpretation of the study’s findings and how they relate to the research question and hypothesis. The conclusion section summarizes the key findings and their implications for understanding. player involvement in video games. It reiterates the study’s significance and offers suggestions for how the results could be applied in the field of video game research.

In terms of ethos, the authors’ names and affiliations are mentioned right at the start of the article, which adds credibility to their research. The reliability of the experiment can also be seen through the acknowledgement of Johna Peitz, the creator of Icy Tower, which is the game used to test MIT in the study. They cite lots of studies and research all throughout the article to support their arguments and claims. It shows that they are knowledgeable and that they’ve done their own research. Logos is also used. In the methods section, they explain how they did the study in detail, which shows the logic in why the experiment makes sense. They explain what kind of game they used and how they measured difficulty. They also explain what statistical analyses they did. This gives a really clear and logical way to look at their study. However, the paper does not use pathos explicitly.

Throughout my analysis, I gained a better understanding of how the authors attempt to persuade their readers of the value and importance of their work. In particular, you will be able to see how the authors employ language, how they cater to the readers’ sense of morality, logos or pathos, and the genre conventions (such as IMRaD). In addition, you can gain a better understanding of the broader implications and relevance of their work to the video game industry by how the authors presented the data.

References

Strojny, P., Strojny, A., & Rębilas, K. (2023). Player involvement as a result of difficulty: An introductory study to test the suitability of the motivational intensity approach to video game research. PLOS ONE, 18(3). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0282966