ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Performance Science
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1620182
Two "faces" of e-sports players: the relationship between facial width-to-height ratio and aggressive behavior in the virtual world
Provisionally accepted
- 1Beijing Technology and Business University, Beijing, China
- 2Central University of Finance and Economics, Beijing, China
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The growing literature has emphasized the role of facial structures in affecting human behavioral tendencies, especially debate on whether a person's facial width-to-height ratio (fWHR) will influence their aggressive behavior. The development of the digital economy and e-sports provide a new research context. E-sports players use virtual characters as representatives rather than engaging in physical fighting. We aimed at exploring the role of fWHR of players and virtual characters regarding the indicators of aggressive behavior. Using the data of 954 professional players of League of Legend (LoL) from 2017 to 2022, we present evidence that e-sports players' fWHR is not significantly associated with their aggressive behavior in the virtual world. We further proved that when the player's real face is more similar to their virtual character's face, they will perform more aggressively. Our studies extend the boundary of fWHR and aggressive behavior research in the digital era.
Keywords: facial features, Virtual Characters, Virtual identity, aggressive behavior, e-sports
Received: 29 Apr 2025; Accepted: 01 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Xu, Li and Lin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Xiaohan Li, sallysept@163.com
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