Measuring audience experience in social videogaming

Social videogaming sessions present a variety of opportunities for interaction and engagement. While active play is the most obvious way that participants can interact during the gaming session, these sessions can also have audience members who are not actively playing. However, there is little understanding about the experience of audience members within a gaming context. We argue that in order to understand audience experience it is necessary to identify and measure its components. In this paper we present the development of an instrument specifically designed for studying the experience of audience members within social videogaming sessions. The instrument consists of a scale based on measures of game player experience, but designed to be more relevant to the game experience of non-players.