The Misrepresentation of Women in Video Games

Authors

Abigail Warr

Keywords

women in videogames, female misrepresentation

Abstract

According to the most recent statistics, 45% of the people who regularly play video games in the United States are now female (Entertainment Software Association, 2021). The video game industry is no longer dominated by male consumers, and yet many times the female roles in video games still do not demonstrate the well-rounded, complex characters that female consumers may want. Instead, women in video games generally seem to display “emphasized femininity” by fulfilling female stereotypes in an unrealistic way (Dill & Thill, 2007). This emphasized femininity can be displayed by being oversexualized (Melzer, 2019; Summers & Miller, 2014), or by displaying femininity to an exaggerated degree (Bègue et al., 2017; Jenson & De Castell, 2021; Summers & Miller, 2014).

Recommended Citation

Warr, Abigail (2022) "The Misrepresentation of Women in Video Games," AWE (A Woman’s Experience): Vol. 9, Article 35.
Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/awe/vol9/iss1/35