184 Chapter 3 Table 4 Pearson correlations of in-game play behaviours during the first and last play-session Last play-session 1234567 First play-session Engaged in-game play behaviours 1. Mindlight - total .05 .09 .01 .04 - .09 .04 .12 2. Exploration - .22 .25 - .36* - .07 - .09 .13 - .13 3. Fear attempt .10 - .20 .17 .03 .06 .02 .12 4. Defeat - .15 .15 .06 .12 .03 .03 - .19 Avoidant/safety in-game play behaviours 5. Mindlight - none .09 .11 - .06 .16 - .17 .12 - .13 6. Ceiling light attempt - .05 - .05 - .14 .03 .18 - .07 .01 7. Inside chest .20 - .07 .30a .01 - .11 - .24 .18 Notes. * p < .05, ** p < .01, *** p < .001, a p = .051, n = 42. All in-game play behaviours are proportions, except for ‘defeat’ and ‘ceiling light attempt’ which are frequencies. Partial correlations testing age and sex as potential suppressor variables showed similar results. In-Game Play Behaviours and Improvements in Anxiety 3 Months Later Table 5 presents hierarchical regression analyses predicting anxiety at the three-month follow-up from the difference in in-game play behaviours from the first to the last play-session controlled for anxiety at pre-test. Model statistics represent the difference in the unique proportion of variance explained by the engaged and avoidant/safety in-game play behaviours respectively, beyond the proportion of variance explained by anxiety at pre-test. Anxiety at pretest explained 44.4% of the variance in anxiety at the three-month follow-up. We hypothesised that increases in engaged in-game play behaviours and decreases in safety/avoidant in-game play behaviours from the first to the last play-session would predict reduction in anxiety symptoms at the threemonth follow-up. In line with these expectations, Table 5 shows that increases in exploration were significantly associated with lower anxiety scores three months later. For the avoidant/safety in-game play behaviours increases in ceiling light attempts and time spent hiding inside chests were significantly associated with higher anxiety scores three months later.
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