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Pervasive Serious Game for Exam Preparation: Exploring the Motivational Effects of Game Narratives
Abstract
German students have a high level of stress due to exam anxiety and performance requirements. Serious games can help improve students’ well-being and performance. The principle of pervasive games also brings many opportunities. Regarding the design of such games, there is still no consensus on which game design elements bring positive effects in which contexts. In this paper, we present a new pervasive serious game for exam preparation. The game design was adapted to investigate the relationship between motivation and game narrative. A pilot study’s results show that the presence of a game narrative did not affect the subjects’ motivation. However, the thematic relationship between the game narrative and learning content seemed to be important for the subjects’ motivation. Overall, most of the subjects enjoyed the game and could imagine preparing for exams with such games in the future.
... Reality [83,88] Augmented Reality [19,22] Virtual reality [16] Gamification design should pick up the discipline and the content, "play" with it, and eventually build up a narrative around it [51]. Narrative-based learning is an active learning methodology that is driven by a narrative using any medium [59]. ...
In recent years, gamified e-learning earned its place in higher education. Aligned to the audience, the content and the learning goals design elements are orchestrated around the backbone of any gamified intervention: the story. The art of storytelling is old and well-established, but digital storytelling is not yet fully explored. To narrow the gap, this chapter derives a solution space for design parameters for digital storytelling from key literature. Informed by this solution space, the next iteration of a gamified e-learning environment on procurement, manufacturing, and sales supported by the Enterprise Resource Planning System SAP S/4 HANA could evolve to add to the body of knowledge. This solution space can inform teachers, e-learning designers, and researchers and accelerate the creative process of digital storytelling.
Background
Objective Structured Clinical Examinations (OSCEs) are among the most anxiety‐provoking competency assessment methods. An online serious game (OSCEGame) was developed and implemented within the OSCE curriculum. This study aimed to evaluate the usefulness of this serious game on preparedness and reducing OSCE‐related stress.
Methods
A serious game was designed to help dental students train for OSCEs. Two game courses (4 stations each) were designed according to year of undergraduate training (4th and 5th year), based on 6 pre‐existing multi‐competency OSCE stations. The OSCEGame was available online on a learning platform 4 to 6 weeks before the summative OSCEs. Game use was evaluated by analysing connection data. Preparedness, stress and time management skills were assessed using a questionnaire following the summative OCSEs. The results of 4th year students (OSCE naive population) were compared to those of 5th year students to assess usefulness and benefits of such preparation method.
Results
In total, 97% and 60% of the students in 4th year and 5th year respectively used the game. The game was seen as an essential preparation tool to reduce anxiety (for 60% of all students) and increase time management skills (65% of all students). However, significant differences were observed between 4th and 5th year students (anxiety reduction: 65% vs. 22%, p <0.001; time management skills: 59% vs. 41%, p<0.05) suggesting that it is most useful for OSCE naive students.
Conclusion
This serious game is a useful time efficient online tool, for OSCE preparation, especially in OSCE naive students.
It seems necessary to review the literature to explore the effectiveness of serious games in education, since the number of studies on serious games is surging up. This study systematically reviewed the literature within around a recent decade. The trend of the number of publications related to use of serious games in education was firstly clarified based on the data retrieved from major databases. Secondly, various factors were determined that influenced the effect of serious game assisted learning. The major section identified both advantages and disadvantages of use of serious games in education. Use of serious games in medical science has been rising in a recent decade, which is thus highlighted in this study. Attitudes toward use of serious games in education were explored, as well as the new development of use of serious games in education. Future theoretical and practical exploration might need interdisciplinary cooperation.
Integrating narrative elements into a game is a key element in designing an immersive experience. Narrative has been hypothesized to improve engagement, motivation, and learning within educational environments. While empirical results have been produced to show that narrative enhances engagement and motivation, its effects on learning were shown to either be insignificant or negative. We, therefore, aim to address the question of how to integrate narrative in a game to improve learning. We address this through the design of May's Journey, an educational game that teaches basic programming concepts where a story is integrated. The game design seamlessly integrates learning goals, core mechanic and narrative elements. In this paper, we discuss the game design as well as a study we conducted to compare two game versions, one with rich narrative and the other with light narrative. Results demonstrate that participants who interacted with the rich narrative version had fewer programming errors and increased engagement within the game. We present our contributions in the form of educational design principles for narrative integration supported by our study and results.
Background
Compared to traditional persuasive technology and health games, gamification is posited to offer several advantages for motivating behaviour change for health and well-being, and increasingly used. Yet little is known about its effectiveness.
Aims
We aimed to assess the amount and quality of empirical support for the advantages and effectiveness of gamification applied to health and well-being.
Methods
We identified seven potential advantages of gamification from existing research and conducted a systematic literature review of empirical studies on gamification for health and well-being, assessing quality of evidence, effect type, and application domain.
Results
We identified 19 papers that report empirical evidence on the effect of gamification on health and well-being. 59% reported positive, 41% mixed effects, with mostly moderate or lower quality of evidence provided. Results were clear for health-related behaviours, but mixed for cognitive outcomes.
Conclusions
The current state of evidence supports that gamification can have a positive impact in health and wellbeing, particularly for health behaviours. However several studies report mixed or neutral effect. Findings need to be interpreted with caution due to the relatively small number of studies and methodological limitations of many studies (e.g., a lack of comparison of gamified interventions to non-gamified versions of the intervention).
In dieser Arbeit wird die Wirkung von Gamification auf Motivation und Leistung sowohl theoretisch betrachtet als auch empirisch untersucht. Gamification wird als ein Prozess der spielerischen Gestaltung von Aktivitäten in einem spielfremden Kontext durch die Verwendung von Spiel-Design-Elementen definiert. Spiel-Design-Elemente sind hierbei einzelne Aspekte aus Spielen.
Trotz des großen Interesses am Thema Gamification und an dessen Wirkungen, weisen eine Vielzahl bisheriger empirischer Studien methodische Mängel auf und werden oftmals nicht theoriegeleitet durchgeführt. Es besteht folglich theoretischer sowie empirischer Forschungsbedarf bezüglich der Untersuchung der Wirkung von Gamification auf Motivation und Leistung.
Zur Betrachtung der Wirkung von Gamification auf Motivation wird die Selbstbestimmungstheorie der Motivation nach Deci und Ryan (1985) auf den Kontext Gamification übertragen. Folglich wird angenommen, dass im Rahmen von Gamification verwendete Spiel-Design-Elemente positiv auf die Erfüllung psychologischer Grundbedürfnisse nach Kompetenz, Autonomie – sowohl bezogen auf wahrgenommene Entscheidungsfreiheit als auch auf erlebte Aufgabenbedeutsamkeit – und sozialer Eingebundenheit wirken können.
Zur Betrachtung der Wirkung von Gamification auf Leistung wird davon ausgegangen, dass sowohl die Erfüllung psychologischer Grundbedürfnisse als auch das gamifizierte Umfeld positiv auf Leistung wirken können.
Im empirischen Teil der Arbeit wird die Wirkung von Gamification auf Motivation und Leistung im Kontext manueller Arbeitsprozesse in zwei experimentellen Studien untersucht.
In einer experimentellen Studie im Rahmen eines manuellen Arbeitsprozesses zeigt sich, dass Gamification mit den Spiel-Design-Elementen Punkte, Abzeichen, Bestenlisten, Team-Bestenlisten, Leistungsgraphen, Narrativ und Avatar einen positiven Effekt auf die Erfüllung der psychologischen Grundbedürfnisse hat. Außerdem zeigt sich, dass Gamification mit diesen Spiel-Design-Elementen sowohl auf qualitative als auch auf quantitative Formen von Leistung positiv wirkt.
In einer zweiten experimentellen Online-Studie wird eine vertiefte Betrachtung der Wirkung einzelner Spiel-Design-Elementen-Gruppen auf die Erfüllung psychologischer Grundbedürfnisse im Rahmen eines simulierten, manuellen Arbeitsprozesses vorgenommen. Die Spiel-Design-Elemente-Gruppe mit Abzeichen, Bestenliste und Leistungsgraphen wirkt positiv auf das Kompetenzerleben und Autonomieerleben bezüglich Aufgabenbedeutsamkeit. Die Spiel-Design-Elemente-Gruppe mit Avatar, Narrativ und zusätzlichen Nicht-Spieler-Charakteren wirkt positiv auf das Erleben sozialer Eingebundenheit.
Die Arbeit zeigt auf, dass sich die Selbstbestimmungstheorie der Motivation nach Deci und Ryan (1985) dazu eignet, die Wirkungen von Gamification zu untersuchen. Das theoretische Rahmenmodell kann als Ausgangspunkt für weitere empirische Untersuchungen verwendet werden. Zukünftige Untersuchung sollten die Wirkung von Gamification in weiteren Kontexten, die Langfristigkeit dieser Wirkung, den Einfluss von Personenmerkmalen und die Wirkung und Interaktionen einzelner Spiel-Design-Elemente fokussiert betrachten.
One of the main problems the field of Serious Game Design is facing, concerns the gap between game design and educational design. It has become evident that to optimize the learning from serious games, pedagogical experts should be actively involved. There have been few documented systematic efforts to engage educators in the design process. To address this limitation, the present study examined the designs of 75 student teachers who attended an undergraduate course on game design. The aim of the study was to map out the difficulties teachers experience when tasked with the design of a serious game. The quality of the designs was determined by examining the presence of game elements and their interrelations. The findings suggest that while some of the designs were satisfactory, overall, the introduction of teachers to game design is challenging, as pedagogical expertise does not appear to be directly transferable to game design. This study details the types of problems the teachers as novice designers faced and discusses the implications for future work.
Der erste Band vermittelte Grundlagenwissen zur Mensch-Computer-Interaktion. Dieses Buch baut darauf auf und widmet sich dem gesamten Entwicklungsprozess von User Interfaces und ausgewählten neueren Entwicklungen. In verständlicher und wissenschaftlich fundierter Weise beschreiben die Autoren, welche Phasen und Methoden das User Interface Engineering prägen. Zahlreiche Praxisbeispiele und Handlungsempfehlungen werden für alle Phasen diskutiert: von der Anforderungsanalyse über das Prototyping bis hin zur Evaluierung interaktiver Systeme.
Immer mehr 3D-Inhalte sind verfügbar, und die Interaktion mit ihnen hat eigene Herausforderungen. Der Mittelteil des Buches ist daher 3D User Interfaces gewidmet. In profunder und kompakter Form werden wesentliche Aspekte behandelt, darunter 3D-Eingabe- und Ausgabegeräte, Kernaufgaben und spezielle 3D-Interaktionstechniken. Computer werden zunehmend in die reale Welt integriert, sind mobil und allgegenwärtig. Der letzte Buchteil widmet sich dafür geeigneten, natürlichen Formen der Interaktion. Nicht nur Multitouch als verbreitete Form wird systematisch diskutiert. Als erstes deutsches Fachbuch widmet sich dieses Buch auch gestischer Interaktion, Tangible User Interfaces und anderen Natural User Interfaces. Eine anschauliche Sprache, farbige Illustrationen und weiterführende Literaturhinweise machen es zu einem umfassenden Kompendium für eine breite Leserschaft.
The literature suggests that gamified learning interventions may increase student engagement and enhance learning. We empirically investigate this by exploring the impact of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation on the participation and performance of over 100 undergraduate students in an online gamified learning intervention. The paper makes a number of contributions. First, by synthesizing the literature the central concepts required for a learning intervention to be considered gamified are mapped and the development of an online gamified learning intervention is described. Second, the effect of gamification on learning outcomes is examined using a pre- and post-intervention survey. We find that gamified learning interventions have a positive impact on student learning. Third, our results show that while generally positive, the impact of gamified intervention*ns on student participation varies depending on whether the student is motivated intrinsically or extrinsically. These findings will be of practical interest to teaching and learning practitioners working in a range of educational contexts, and at all levels of education, who wish to increase student engagement and enhance learning.
In this paper we explore how gamification can be applied to education in order to improve student engagement. We present a study in which a college course was gamified, by including experience points, levels, badges, challenges and leaderboards. The study was five years long, where the first three were non-gamified years, and the last two regarded two successive experiments of our gamified approach. To assess how gamification impacted the learning experience, we compared data from both gamified and non-gamified years, using different performance measures. Results show significant improvements in terms of attention to reference materials, online participation and proactivity. They also suggest that our approach can reduce grade discrepancies among students and help them score better. Modeling course activities with game challenges and properly distributing those over the term seem to enhance this effect.
Games are of great interest in education. Their motivational qualities make players more persistent and resilient. In particular, virtual environments have proven to be good learning engagers, as they generate opportunities to create, explore and communicate. Here we present an exploratory study on how student autonomy and creativity can be improved by mixing virtual environments and gamification. To attain this, we added to a gamified course a 2.5D virtual environment that grows along with student grading, called AvatarWorld. There, students are represented by customized avatars, and they also can create custom content. Preliminary results suggest that even though students did not spend too much time in AvatarWorld, they were motivated to perform creative tasks that required knowledge acquired in the course.
When compared with more traditional instructional methods, Game-based e-learning (GbEl) promises a higher motivation of learners by presenting contents in an interactive, rule-based and competitive way. Most recent systematic reviews and meta-analysis of studies on Game-based learning and GbEl in the medical professions have shown limited effects of these instructional methods.
To compare the effectiveness on the learning outcome of a Game-based e-learning (GbEl) instruction with a conventional script-based instruction in the teaching of phase contrast microscopy urinalysis under routine training conditions of undergraduate medical students.
A randomized controlled trial was conducted with 145 medical students in their third year of training in the Department of Urology at the University Medical Center Freiburg, Germany. 82 subjects where allocated for training with an educational adventure-game (GbEl group) and 69 subjects for conventional training with a written script-based approach (script group). Learning outcome was measured with a 34 item single choice test. Students' attitudes were collected by a questionnaire regarding fun with the training, motivation to continue the training and self-assessment of acquired knowledge.
THE STUDENTS IN THE GBEL GROUP ACHIEVED SIGNIFICANTLY BETTER RESULTS IN THE COGNITIVE KNOWLEDGE TEST THAN THE STUDENTS IN THE SCRIPT GROUP: the mean score was 28.6 for the GbEl group and 26.0 for the script group of a total of 34.0 points with a Cohen's d effect size of 0.71 (ITT analysis). Attitudes towards the recent learning experience were significantly more positive with GbEl. Students reported to have more fun while learning with the game when compared to the script-based approach.
Game-based e-learning is more effective than a script-based approach for the training of urinalysis in regard to cognitive learning outcome and has a high positive motivational impact on learning. Game-based e-learning can be used as an effective teaching method for self-instruction.
Recent years have seen a rapid proliferation of mass-market consumer software that takes inspiration from video games. Usually summarized as "gamification", this trend connects to a sizeable body of existing concepts and research in human-computer interaction and game studies, such as serious games, pervasive games, alternate reality games, or playful design. However, it is not clear how "gamification" relates to these, whether it denotes a novel phenomenon, and how to define it. Thus, in this paper we investigate "gamification" and the historical origins of the term in relation to precursors and similar concepts. It is suggested that "gamified" applications provide insight into novel, gameful phenomena complementary to playful phenomena. Based on our research, we propose a definition of "gamification" as the use of game design elements in non-game contexts.
The purpose of the present research was to develop and validate a situational (or state) measure of motivation, the Situational Motivation Scale (SIMS). The SIMS is designed to assess the constructs of intrinsic motivation, identified regulation, external regulation, and amotivation (E. L. Deci & R. M. Ryan, 1985, 1991) in field and laboratory settings. Five studies were conducted to develop and validate the SIMS. Overall, results show that the SIMS is composed of 4 internally consistent factors. The construct validity of the scale is also supported by correlations with other constructs as postulated by current theories. Moreover, the SIMS is responsive to experimental induction as evidenced by data gathered through a laboratory study. In sum, the SIMS represents a brief and versatile self-report measure of situational intrinsic motivation, identified regulation, external regulation, and amotivation.
Educational gamification is a growing field. The authors answer the following important questions: (a) To what degree does educational gamification, in general, increase students' perceived motivation in learning? (b) To what degree do specific game elements impact perceived motivation in learning? and (c) Are the benefits of gamification limited to or enhanced in participants with specific demographic characteristics? A survey of organizational behavior students' perceptions (n = 124) investigated how participating in a gamified course motivated students overall and examined the individual effect of specific game elements. Of the participants, 67.7% reported that the gamified course was more or much more motivating than a traditional course. Correlational data indicated that being a member of any measured demographic (e.g., gender, age, student status) was not a barrier to finding gamification motivating.
Pervasive gaming is a genre of gaming systematically blurring and breaking the traditional boundaries of game. The limits of the magic circle are explored in spatial, temporal and social dimensions. These ways of expanding the game are not new, since many intentional and unintentional examples of similar expansions can be found from earlier games, but the recently emerged fashion of pervasive gaming is differentiated with the use of these expansions in new, efficient ways to produce new kinds of gameplay experiences. These new game genres include alternate reality games, reality games, trans-reality games and crossmedia games.
The project conceived in 1929 by Gardner Murphy and the writer aimed first to present a wide array of problems having to do with five major "attitude areas"--international relations, race relations, economic conflict, political conflict, and religion. The kind of questionnaire material falls into four classes: yes-no, multiple choice, propositions to be responded to by degrees of approval, and a series of brief newspaper narratives to be approved or disapproved in various degrees. The monograph aims to describe a technique rather than to give results. The appendix, covering ten pages, shows the method of constructing an attitude scale. A bibliography is also given.