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Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions
In most professional sports, playing field structure is kept neutral so that scoring imbalances may be attributed to differences in team skill. It thus remains unknown what impact environmental heterogeneities can have on scoring dynamics or competitive advantages. Applying a novel generative model...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group
2013
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6505965/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24166062 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep03067 |
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author | Merritt, Sears Clauset, Aaron |
author_facet | Merritt, Sears Clauset, Aaron |
author_sort | Merritt, Sears |
collection | PubMed |
description | In most professional sports, playing field structure is kept neutral so that scoring imbalances may be attributed to differences in team skill. It thus remains unknown what impact environmental heterogeneities can have on scoring dynamics or competitive advantages. Applying a novel generative model of scoring dynamics to roughly 10 million team competitions drawn from an online game, we quantify the relationship between the structure within a competition and its scoring dynamics, while controlling the impact of chance. Despite wide structural variations, we observe a common three-phase pattern in the tempo of events. Tempo and balance are highly predictable from a competition's structural features alone and teams exploit environmental heterogeneities for sustained competitive advantage. Surprisingly, the most balanced competitions are associated with specific environmental heterogeneities, not from equally skilled teams. These results shed new light on the design principles of balanced competition, and illustrate the potential of online game data for investigating social dynamics and competition. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6505965 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2013 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-65059652019-05-21 Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions Merritt, Sears Clauset, Aaron Sci Rep Article In most professional sports, playing field structure is kept neutral so that scoring imbalances may be attributed to differences in team skill. It thus remains unknown what impact environmental heterogeneities can have on scoring dynamics or competitive advantages. Applying a novel generative model of scoring dynamics to roughly 10 million team competitions drawn from an online game, we quantify the relationship between the structure within a competition and its scoring dynamics, while controlling the impact of chance. Despite wide structural variations, we observe a common three-phase pattern in the tempo of events. Tempo and balance are highly predictable from a competition's structural features alone and teams exploit environmental heterogeneities for sustained competitive advantage. Surprisingly, the most balanced competitions are associated with specific environmental heterogeneities, not from equally skilled teams. These results shed new light on the design principles of balanced competition, and illustrate the potential of online game data for investigating social dynamics and competition. Nature Publishing Group 2013-10-29 /pmc/articles/PMC6505965/ /pubmed/24166062 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep03067 Text en Copyright © 2013, Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareALike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ |
spellingShingle | Article Merritt, Sears Clauset, Aaron Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
title | Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
title_full | Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
title_fullStr | Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
title_full_unstemmed | Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
title_short | Environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
title_sort | environmental structure and competitive scoring advantages in team competitions |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6505965/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24166062 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep03067 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT merrittsears environmentalstructureandcompetitivescoringadvantagesinteamcompetitions AT clausetaaron environmentalstructureandcompetitivescoringadvantagesinteamcompetitions |