Advocating Netnography for Esports Research

This perspective article argues that netnography, a qualitative method for studying online communities, is well suited to addressing persistent challenges in esports research. The author identifies three areas where existing literature is thin: marketing, particularly toxic behavior and its effect on engagement and consumer lifestyle choices; psychology, including emotional stressors, coping strategies, and team dynamics; and gender, where harassment, exclusion, and the intersection of gender identity with player experience remain underexamined. The paper's central claim is that netnography's immersive, interaction-based approach can capture the social and cultural complexity these areas demand, which surveys and experimental designs often miss.

The article supports its argument mainly through conceptual reasoning and a review of prior work rather than new empirical data. It draws on a set of recent studies, such as systematic reviews of esports stressors and team structures and research on gender-based harassment and lifestyle outcomes linked to gaming, to show where gaps exist. It then illustrates how netnographic practices, including immersion, active engagement, and attention to digital traces and multimodal communication, could be applied to each domain. The paper does not report a sample, data collection procedure, or measured outcomes, so its contribution is positional and methodological rather than evidentiary.