The Effect of Total Sleep Deprivation on the Cognitive and In-Game Performance of Rocket League Esport Players

Tim D Smithies,1,2 Adam J Toth,1– 4 Mark J Campbell1– 4 1Department of Physical Education & Sport Sciences, University of Limerick, Castletroy, Limerick, Ireland; 2Lero the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Software, University of Limerick, Castletroy, Limerick, Ireland; 3Health Research Institute, University of Limerick, Castletroy, Limerick, Ireland; 4Centre for Sport Leadership, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South AfricaCorrespondence: Tim D Smithies, Lero the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Software, University of Limerick, Castletroy, Limerick, Ireland, Tel +61484391133, Email [email protected]: It is presumed by many that acute sleep loss results in degraded in-game esports (competitive, organized video game play) performance. However, this has not been experimentally investigated to date. The objective of the current experiment was to elucidate whether ~29hrs of total sleep deprivation impacts in-game performance for the popular esport Rocket League.Patients and Methods: Twenty skill-matched pairs (N = 40 total) were recruited. Within each pair, one participant was assigned to an intervention group (TSD), while the other was assigned to a control group (CON). Two test sessions occurred; one while both participants were rested (baseline), and the other while the CON participant was rested but the TSD participant was sleep deprived (experimental).Results: Following total sleep deprivation, TSD participants reported higher Karolinska Sleepiness Scale-measured subjective sleepiness and lower subjective alertness and motivation, as well as worsened PVT response speed and ~5 times greater PVT lapse incidence, and worsened response speed on a two-choice categorization task. However, overall in-game Rocket League performance did not worsen due to total sleep deprivation. Exploratory analyses of performance indicators suggest a potential shift toward a simpler and safer strategy following sleep deprivation.Conclusion: Following a bout of ~29hrs total sleep deprivation, overall in-game Rocket League performance remained unaffected. This presents as a promising finding given the high potential for acute pre-competition sleep disturbance in esports, though habitual sleep remains a concern for esport athletes.Plain Language Summary: Esports are quite comfortably the fastest growing competitive activity worldwide. We performed the first experimental study exploring how an acute bout of sleep loss impacts in-game performance in any esport. We found 29 hours without sleep to have no impact on in-game outcome. This presents as a positive finding for esport athletes and coaches alike but certainly does not absolve sleep from being an impactful human factor within esports. Future studies should explore other esports with characteristics (ie, longer bouts of sustained attention, such as Multiplayer Online Battle Arena or MOBA esports) purportedly sensitive to sleep loss to see if the impact of sleep loss on esports performance is specific or agnostic to esport genre.Keywords: gaming, human factors, athletes, cognition, task-switching, in-game performance