The nerdlinger hub up at the Nottingham Trent University has revealed new findings in research based around – gulp – online gamers’ virtual gender swaps and sex roles.

They’ve discovered that up to 66% of RPG users actually pick characters or avatars in the opposite of sex to what they are, with 70% of women being the most likely to pick a male character, to “avoid unsolicited male approaches” according to lead researcher Zaheer Hussain. Just 54% of men admitted to choosing a female persona, but there’s no surprise there.

Hidden within the press release on these findings, which are to be published in the US journal CyberPyschology and Behaviour, is a little nugget claiming that men believe they are treated better as females in male-dominated games such as World Of Warcraft, and that it enables them to “flirt with male characters…