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Understanding and Fostering Children’s Storytelling During Game Narrative Design
Abstract
Children typically have extensive expertise and experiences of computer games, which can enable them to make valuable contributions when involved in the design of games. Within this paper we discuss our approach to the involvement of children in the game design process, specifically to inform a game narrative. We describe two design workshops with children, which focused on the design of the narrative within a literacy game based on the Day of the Dead festival. We describe how the knowledge that resulted from these workshops furthered our understanding of children's storytelling schema and preferences for games as well as their approach to story creation and expression during the game design process. We also discuss how our findings informed an initial set of design principles for guiding narrative design within children's games as well as recommendations for including storytelling design activities within the technology design process.
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... Ribeiro, et al. [71] concede that human culture and society influence the idea of game design. Besides that, important knowledge regarding children's experiences, presumptions, and cultural values and beliefs can be key points in designing serious games [70]. Additionally, developers should be sensitive to an individual learner's psychological profiles along with cultural and contextual influences when designing games [72]. ...
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a deficit-driven
neurodevelopmental condition in three areas, which are social
interactions, communication, and the presence of restricted
interests and repetitive behaviours. Children with autism mainly
suffer from emotional disturbance that emerges as meltdowns,
tantrums, and aggression, increasing the risk of developing
mental health issues. Several studies have assessed the use of
serious games in helping children with autism enhance their
communication, learning, and social skills. Significantly, these
serious games focus on the strengths and weaknesses of the
disorder to establish a comfortable and controlled environment
that is able to support children with autism. However, there is
still a lack of evidence in studies exploring the use of serious
games for children with autism to facilitate the development of
emotion regulation. The aim of this study is to consolidate and
propose a new serious game design principle for children with
autism to facilitate the development of emotion regulation. The
target age of the children involved in this study ranged between 6
and 12. A review of previous literature on serious game design
principles was conducted. More than 70 articles related to serious
games for children with autism were analysed using thematic
analysis. This study found 16 elements that influenced the
designing and developing process of creating a serious game for
children with autism. It has been organised and categorised into
five attributes (user, game objectives, game elements, game
aesthetics, and player experience). Certainly, this study
demonstrates the needs and requirements of children with autism
when designing serious games.
... Many have attempted to enact this value by investigating and creating opportunities for children's storytelling. There are many examples of designs for creative storytelling from creating tangible computing storytelling objects (e.g., [20,53]), to engaging children in narrative creation for video games [11], to supporting them in creating video dialogs with remote peers [32]. Some designs empower youth to use mobile storytelling as a way to create and share their experiences with friends and family [12,24]. ...
Youth content creators have been under-researched on video platforms such as Snapchat, YouTube, Instagram, etc. In order to better understand the ways that technology could support youth as content creators we conducted a 30-week series of workshops with an intergenerational design team including pre-teen youth and undergraduate designers-in-training. Qualitative analysis of workshop videos and notes revealed underlying challenges in video creation related to the social dynamics of creating videos in groups. In line with previous work, we note that a primary motivation for using social media is to spend time with friends. We found that existing video technology reveals opportunities and challenges to support the collaboration and interaction that motivates youth creators. We offer illustrative designs of potential collaborations in video sharing technology and propose that some of the concerns of youth social media use could be addressed by incorporating more opportunities for social creation.
... Among narrative techniques, the use of storytelling supported by visual representations, materials crafted by children and physical acting, is an effective approach to leverage the natural children playfulness and imagination. Examples of different activities and methods designed around storytelling can be found in (Wright, 2007;Dindler et al., 2005;Benton et al., 2014). ...
This thesis investigates the intersections of three disciplines, that are Design Research, Human-Robot Interaction studies, and Child Studies. In particular, this doctoral research is focused on two research questions, namely, what is (or might be) the role of design research in HRI? And, how to design acceptable and desirable child-robot play applications?
The rst chapter introduces an overview of the mutual interest between robotics and design that is at the basis of the research. On the one hand, the interest of design toward robotics is documented through some exemplary projects from artists and designers that speculate on the human-robot coexistence condition. Vice versa, the robotics interest toward design is documented by referring to some tracks of robotic conferences, scienti c workshops and robotics journals which focused on the design-robotics relationship. Finally, a brief description of the background conditions that characterized this doctoral research are introduced, such as the fact of being a research founded by a company.
The second chapter provides an overview of the state of the art of the intersections between three multidisciplinary disciplines. First, a de nition of Design Research is provided, together with its main trends and open issues. Then, the review focuses on the contribution of Design Research to the HRI eld, which can be summed up in actions focused on three aspects: artefacts, stakeholders, and contexts.
This is followed by a focus on the role of Design Research within the context of children studies, in which it is possible to identify two main design-child relationships: design as a method for developing children’s learning experiences; and children as part of the design process for developing novel interactive systems.
The third chapter introduces the Research through Design (RtD) approach and its relevance in conducting design research in HRI. The proposed methodology, based on this approach, is particularly characterized by the presence of design explorations as study methods. These, in turn, are developed through a common project’s
methodology, also reported in this chapter.
The fourth chapter is dedicated to the analysis of the scenario in which the child-robot interaction takes place. This was aimed at understanding what is edutainment robotics for children, its common features, how it relates to existing children play types, and where the interaction takes place. The chapter provides also a focus on the relationship between children and technology on a more general level, through which two themes and relative design opportunities were identi ed: physically active play and objects-to-think-with.
These were respectively addressed in the two design explorations presented in this thesis: Phygital Play and Shybo.
The Phygital Play project consists of an exploration of natural interaction modalities with robots, through mixed-reality, for fostering children’s active behaviours. To this end, a game platform was developed for allowing children to play with or against a robot, through body movement.
Shybo, instead, is a low-anthropomorphic robot for playful learning activities with children that can be carried out in educational contexts. The robot, which reacts to properties of the physical environment, is designed to support different kinds of experiences.
Then, the chapter eight is dedicated to the research outcomes, that were de ned through a process of re ection. The contribution of the research was analysed and documented by focusing on three main levels, namely: artefact, knowledge and theory. The artefact level corresponds to the situated implementations developed through the projects. The knowledge level consists of a set of actionable principles, emerged from the results and lessons learned from the projects. At the theory level, a theoretical framework was proposed with the aim of informing the future design of child- robot play applications.
The last chapter provides a nal overview of the doctoral research, a series of limitations regarding the research, its process and its outcomes, and some indications for future research.
This paper aims to develop new co-design techniques for narrative design from scratch in the digital game design process with children. Designing from scratch requires the plain preferences of children and creativity (creative contributions) from their intrinsic drives. Therefore, it is crucial to understand and leverage “children’s imagination”. To trigger children’s imagination, we proposed three novel approaches to develop new co-design techniques that are based on (1) game elements, (2) narrative models, and (3) Philosophy for Children (P4C). Using these approaches, narrative design processes for digital games were performed by an intergenerational design team that included eight children aged 7–11. Children played the role of design partners in the participatory design setting. Data analysis was performed using an analysis framework with two domains: co-design process (implementation, involvement of children, and involvement of adults) and game narrative design (involvement of children and product features). The first technique, Five Elements, was based on game elements and had many strengths in game narrative design and the involvement of children and adults. There are some challenges in implementation because it requires a substantial time commitment, it is not easy to allocate adult team members, and it is difficult to arrange the environment. The second technique, Game Motif, was based on narrative models and had many strengths in all of the criteria, except variety in game genres, which is related to product features. The third technique, Superhero Enquiry, was based on P4C and had limited strengths, including the involvement of children in the co-design process and game narrative design. This paper indicates the strengths and challenges of the new techniques and presents the techniques themselves. It offers some improvements to use these approaches in more effective ways. Consequently, academia and industry can benefit greatly from the contributions of children’s imagination when designing digital games for children using these new techniques appropriately in a given context.
Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate which narrative elements of digital game narratives are
preferred by the general adolescent population, and to examine associations with gender, socioeconomic status
(SES), and gameplay frequency. Further, the study aims to discuss how results can be translated to serious
digital games.
Materials and Methods: Adolescents were recruited through school to complete a survey on narrative preferences
in digital games. The survey included questions on sociodemographic information, frequency of gameplay, and an
open-ended question on what could be an appealing narrative for them. Data were analyzed in a mixed-methods
approach, using thematic analysis and chi-square analyses to determine narrative preferences and the associations
between game narrative elements and player characteristics (gender, SES, and frequency of gameplay).
Results: The sample consisted of 446 adolescents (12–15 years old) who described 30 narrative subthemes.
Preferences included human characters as protagonists; nonhuman characters only as antagonists; realistic
settings, such as public places or cities; and a strong conflict surrounding crime, catastrophe, or war. Girls more
often than boys defined characters by their age, included avatars, located the narrative in private places,
developed profession-related skills, and included a positive atmosphere. Adolescents of nonacademic education
more often than adolescents of academic education defined characters by criminal actions. Infrequent players
more often included human characters defined by their age than frequent players. After performing a Bonferroni
correction, narrative preferences for several gender differences remained.
Conclusion: Different narrative elements related to subgroups of adolescents by gender, SES, and frequency of
gameplay. Customization of narratives in serious digital health games should be warranted for boys and girls;
yet, further research is needed to specify how to address girls in particular.
Background:
Children affected with cystic fibrosis do respiratory exercises to release the mucus stuck in their lungs.
Objective:
The objective of our study was to develop prototypes of digital games that use breath pressure to make this daily physiotherapy more fun.
Methods:
We used a participatory design approach and organized short events to invite contributors from different disciplines to develop game prototypes. From the 6 prototypes, 3 were tested by 10 children during a prestudy. The source code of the games, of which 2 continue to be developed, has been released on the internet under fair use licenses.
Results:
We discuss 7 themes of importance in designing games for health, combining our experience with a review a posteriori of literature.
Conclusions:
This study provides examples of games and their pitfalls as well as recommendations to create games for health in a participatory approach that enables everyone to improve and adapt the work done.
Games offer a compelling medium for learning. However, designing a successful learning game that features engagement alongside its educational objectives is a craft that is still underway. Our research adapts a user-centered approach toward designing a game that will teach children conflict resolution skills. By involving users of the game, namely teachers and students, in the design process we reveal new considerations for how to create convincing narratives of conflict, sustain children's engagement and gain teachers' support. At the same time, our work highlights the challenges facing researchers in this domain who must balance users' values, needs and expectations with the game's learning objectives.
This paper describes the process by which a group of seven and eight year old children designed their own digital writing tools following their own study of digital pens, personal digital assistants and tablet PCs. Some of the children's thoughts about the three technologies are presented and how these were carried through into their own designs is explored. It was found that although the children were quite individual in their designs, their peers easily influenced them and their designs were limited by their abilities with the low-tech prototyping environments. The paper concludes with some ideas for further work and provides some guidelines for researchers wanting to carry out design activities with children.
This paper proposes a design approach to build casual games by children for children. Children understand game narratives with previously acquired schemata that is different from adults. Hence, integrating narrative developed by children themselves into game design may serve the children well. Using a narrative approach to game design based on informant design methods, the proposed approach aims to maximize the contribution of both children informants and adult designers. It comprises of three major phases, namely Narrative Design, Game Design and Design Moderation. A mobile phone game was developed based on this approach. User testing revealed that the children generally enjoyed the game and that the proposed approach has promising potential in empowering the child designers. Future work will focus on further evaluation of the approach for refinement.
In this paper we present Fictional Inquiry, a collaborative Participatory Design technique that provides an approach that allows designers to shape the context of collaborative design activities. Fictional Inquiry allows designers to address specific issues when inquiring into existing use practices, or exploring the future in the collaborative design process. Fictional Inquiry entails bypassing existing socio-cultural structures by creating partially fictional situations, artifacts, and narratives that mediate collaborative design activities. In this paper we present the Fictional Inquiry technique through three cases that highlight the applicability of the technique when staging the design situation, evoking ideas for possible futures, and initiating organizational change. We present a general framework for understanding and staging Fictional Inquiry, and provide an account of how Fictional Inquiry was used in three quite different design situations.
Thematic analysis is a poorly demarcated, rarely acknowledged, yet widely used qualitative analytic method within psychology. In this paper, we argue that it offers an accessible and theoretically flexible approach to analysing qualitative data. We outline what thematic analysis is, locating it in relation to other qualitative analytic methods that search for themes or patterns, and in relation to different epistemological and ontological positions. We then provide clear guidelines to those wanting to start thematic analysis, or conduct it in a more deliberate and rigorous way, and consider potential pitfalls in conducting thematic analysis. Finally, we outline the disadvantages and advantages of thematic analysis. We conclude by advocating thematic analysis as a useful and flexible method for qualitative research in and beyond psychology.
There is a need for educational researchers to find connections between formal education and the many other activities and contexts which inhabit the "real world" of children. While there has been some research on the potential of game playing for learning, the benefits of game making activities have not been examined. In this paper we present the analysis of a design session in which four elementary school-students designed computer games to teach fractions to other students. We analyzed the design interactions in a microgenetic fashion to identify the progression of students' mathematical thinking. In addition, we paid close attention to the contribution of students' social interactions to the increasing sophistication of fraction representations in the game context. We argue in this paper that not only is the context of game-making itself relevant to children's "real world," but that it also provides opportunities for children to explore mathematical ideas within many other "real world" scenes and situations as they design their games.
This paper describes a new co-design technique for early
stages of the design process called Embodied Narratives.
The technique leverages children's natural playfulness to
inspire and motivate the design process, and it uses
technology as a part of the process to encourage
exploration and improvisation in familiar settings. Its
outcome is not the final design but valuable material for
further co-design activities. The paper expands the set of
available techniques that can be used for co-designing with
children, and contributes to growing research on the use of
performances in design through empirical studies
conducted with 36 children from age 10 to 11.
Children represent an increasingly relevant target group of the game industry. Nevertheless, they are rarely involved in development processes. This article introduces child-centered game development (CCGD) approaches for the game design within the context of the school. Therefore, suitable HCI approaches from user-centered and participatory design as well as educational principles and approaches were used as a foundation. The CCGD approaches illustrate how to guide the involvement and participation of children aged 10–14 years in school classes within the development process of games. Approaches for the analysis, conceptualization, and design phases were developed and applied.
This paper discusses the involvement of children in the design of two game-based learning environments, Talarius and Virtual
Peatland. The aim of the study was to explore the experiences of both the children and the developers related to the children's
participation in the development process and on the participation activities employed in the projects. The first project,
Talarius, indicated that while the children enjoyed the project as a whole, there were problems with providing them with a
genuine feeling of ownership and with the children recognizing their contributions in the final outcome. Hence, the framework
of user involvement that was used as the basis of the Talarius project was further expanded by bringing in principles and
practices from other disciplines. This extended multidisciplinary framework was applied in the second project, Virtual Peatland.
This did not eliminate all the problems with the children being able to track the evolution of the application from the initial
ideas to the final outcome, but especially the inclusion of content creation activities was very important to the children
as it made their creations directly visible and thereby promoted their feeling of contribution.