As promised, the thesis on social control in NWN RP PW communities has been completed and you can view it in its entirety here: http://www.itlaw.sk/nwnpws/oSO_SC_Kucera.pdf
Since it might be a tad hard to digest, here is the synopsis:
(CoA - City of Arabel, EftU - Escape from the Underdark, MD - Myth Drannor, Narfell needed no abbreviation)
SHA is an estimate of summary activity throughout the server's history. The score represents intensity of activity server-wide, not its depth. Higher number means comparatively more DMs and more characters and forum posts per player in less time. SHA CoA: 16196 SHA EftU: 2723 SHA MD: 18619 SHA Narfell: 9943
SPP is an estimate of player proactiveness throughout the server's history. This score represents independence of player activity from DM activity. Higher number means comparatively more characters and forum posts per player in less time and with less DMs to sustain it.
SPP CoA: 11,83 SPP EftU: 4,72 SPP MD: 2,30 SPP Narfell: 3,98
A script was used to record the actual number of people on the server and on the main IRC channel in roughly 4-hour intervals during two weeks in March 2007. It indicates the current activity on the server:
Average players online: CoA: 30 EftU: 25 MD: 13 Narfell:18
Average IRC users online: CoA: 50 EftU: 59 MD: N/A Narfell: 49
The current community activity development shows the potential of the server to develop further: SADP CoA: 7745 SADP EftU: 26181 SADP MD: 559 SADP Narfell: 12036
The score represents synergies contributing to a continuously evolving community. Higher number signifies comparatively higher activity of players, more active DMs, more people being able to interact synchronously with each other, both on IRC and in-game, and a younger community that most people have not become tired of yet. I might have made a mistake in not fixing the weight of community age in the formula, hence the high score of EftU since it is by far the youngest community.
Of interest is also the fact that the older the community is, the longer people tend to stay in its IRC channel.
Now come the basic characteristics of the surveyed population. Although it is inferred from the sample only, you can consider it roughly applicable for the entire population of roleplaying NWN PWs.
Region: Continental Europe: 21,8% players UK & Ireland: 12,8% players USA: 43,6% Canada: 10,3% Australia & NZ: 9% Other: 2,6%
Sex: Male: 91% Female: 9%
Average age: 24 years (in the sample, 13 was the lowest age and 50 was the highest)
Average player household size: 3,38 people, including the player.
Marital status: 24,4% players are married or living together 67,9% players are single, have never married 5,1% players are divorced, separated or widowed
Employment: 3,8% are self-employed 57,7% are in paid employment (including part-time working students) 32,1% are unemployed
The average NWN RP PW player has spent 14,4 years in schools so far.
The average NWN RP PW player speaks 1 foreign language; players from continental Europe speak 2,5 foreign languages.
The average NWN RP PW player has been playing NWN online for 33,6 months, i.e. almost 3 years; however, most of them have played only on a couple of PWs (3 on average).
Of every 10 people the average NWN RP PW player interacts with, he considers 4 as his friends. Myth Drannor, according to this, is the tightest community: CoA: 5 out of 10 EftU: 3 out of 10 MD: 7,5 out of 10 Narfell: 4 ouf of 10
Now about the core part of the research:
All four communities have similar levels of social control in general, but there do exist some significant differences on lower levels of analysis.
(please note that since the numbers are small <0,1> and still cover the entire range of possibilities, even small numeric differences mean considerable difference in reality)
Social control potential in each community (to what extent and how intensely do players effect social control among themselves): CoA: 0,4136 EftU: 0,4185 MD: 0,4416 Narfell: 0,4508
(0 is no tension and social control, 1 is absolute tension and social control, sanctioning even positive deviance; 0,5 is the ideal within the research)
Informational saturation in each community (to what extent the players think they know what community norms are): CoA: 0,4480 EftU: 0,5478 MD: 0,4851 Narfell: 0,5412
(0 is total ignorance, 1 is absolute knowledgeability - only subjectively perceived, mind - the ideal value is estimated at around 0,8; the low numbers are partly because the behaviours you rated were not entirely agreed on by the DMs either, so no wonder players felt confused)
Norm sensitivity congruence in each community (shows how close are the players' attitudes to DMs' in the community - the ideal value is 1 - of course, such ideal is only an abstract value and cannot be ever attained; values below 0,5 would make any community impossible to exist): CoA: 0,8448 EftU: 0,9661 MD: 0,8257 Narfell: 0,9722
Even though the attitudes are close, players are often not aware of it which hinders the social control they might effect.
If informational saturation is multiplicand and norm sensitivity congruence the multiplier, we get informational empowerment index which means to what extent could the DMs rely on the players in regulating the playerbase: CoA: 0,3785 EftU: 0,5292 MD: 0,4005 Narfell: 0,5262
(1 would essentially mean players can take over and no one would notice any difference) :-)
I calculated in advance how valid the results would be based on the questionnaires returned and distribution of people who filled them out compared to the entire population distribution. The results confirmed the validity ex post, but maybe there is an anomaly in one of the communities I did not observe, and these numbers show the chance it is not so: CoA: 26,5% EftU: 83,7% MD: 14,1% Narfell: 54,2%
It is up to you to judge if the results correspond with your own experience from the servers you have played on.
You can view social control potential and informational saturation for each of the behaviours in the questionnaire in the thesis (p. 55) as well as how do they differ based on the demographic data (age, education and length of playing on p. 57 and sex, region, marital status and employment status on p. 58).
If you want to know some particular correlation or statistics, feel free to ask me via a PM and I will see whether it can be extracted.
Thanks again for your help; I hope you enjoyed reading about how your community stands compared to the others.
(note: the identical text has been posted on all four communities' forums)