Exploring Users’ Affordance Perceptions of Esports in Immersive Virtual Ecosystems
<p dir="ltr">Esports is converging with immersive virtual ecosystems (IVEs; VR/AR/XR) and platformised media. While “metaverse” affordances are widely discussed, we lack user-driven, empirical evidence of how communities <i>perceive and emotionally evaluate</i><i> </i>these affordances at scale. This project analyses public Reddit posts and Steam reviews to explore experiential affordances and their emotional valence, and theorises how <b>platform trust</b> modulates these dynamics.</p><p dir="ltr"><b>Research questions</b></p><p dir="ltr">· <b>RQ1- </b>What experiential affordances are most salient in user discourse about immersive esports/VR?</p><p dir="ltr">· <b>RQ2 - </b>How does affective sentiment differ across affordance themes?</p><p dir="ltr">· <b>RQ3 -</b> How have topic prevalence and sentiments evolved over time and across platforms (Reddit vs. Steam)?</p><p dir="ltr">· <b>RQ4 -</b> How can these patterns inform a multi-layered model linking affordances, emotional valence, and platform trust?</p><p><br></p>
