Riot producer: Addressing bad League of Legends behavior is 'a major focus for us'

A couple of months ago we reported on Riot's decision to assemble a 30-man development team to address adolescent behavioral issues in League of Legends.

Now, hot on the heels of a high-profile banning incident involving Team Dignitas pro Christian Rivera, Gamasutra has interviewed LoL lead producer Travis George about the Player Behavior and Justice team (known internally as PB&J), which includes both game designers and academic researchers.

George and Riot are hopeful that incentivizing good behavior and throwing a couple of PhDs (in neuroscience and behavioral psychology) into the mix will enable the firm to get a handle on the MOBA title's nefarious community, which was described as a "worldwide problem" in recent player surveys. "You can apply really good research and science techniques to almost anything," George explains. "The trick is just finding what you want to actually spend the time on, and that's where the sentiment for players comes in as a huge guiding factor to that."