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Adding Social To Learning Games

 

Game Based Learning  |  3 MIN

Adding Social To Learning Games

Written by Abhijit Kadle

Adding Social To Learning Games
As our services in game design and development advance, we’re often asked how ‘social gaming’ paradigms can be used in learning games. My instant response to those would be ‘yes’ it’s possible; but faltered on further details. I’ve been doing some thinking about social games; what makes them tick. Some thoughts:

We must bank on the capital sins – wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony; while these are ‘no no’s in the real world, social games seem to capitalize on them to a large extent. When designing a social learning game, I’d definitely want to include one or more of these in some way or the other. It’s great to use the weak moments during game-play to push elements of learning value/content through to the player. Social game developers and studios use these to monetize their product, as learning designers we can use these to capitalize on learning.

Greed is an exceptional instance, game players are greedy, they want more. Build a mechanic where they’ll want learning content to further their progress toward the game objective. It seems manipulative, but social games do it all the time. According to Jaak Panksepp, a neuroscientist at the Falk Center for Molecular Therapeutics at Northwestern University, dopamine has been found to play a crucial role in choice, learning, and belief formation. How do I get learning games to activate the dopamine centers in the brain and encourage neuroplasticity, very important for adult learners. It’s interesting to see ‘learning’ mentioned, rewards are definitely part of influencing behavioral change.

HealthSeeker

An example I can think of is ‘Healthseeker’ for people living with diabetes, designed to make diabetes patients take small incremental steps towards better health. The game does two clear things:

  1. Instantly gratifies individuals with rewards for doing healthy things; unlike the actual long-term health reward for doing healthy things
  2. Allows individuals to use those rewards to further award other players doing healthy things

Missions in this game are typically made up of healthy actions that players could take to improve their health. It seems that incremental actions, regardless of how small they tend to be effective in trying to achieve ‘the goal’, it’s better than doing nothing at all. The game designers hope that these incremental actions will percolate into a player’s real life and actually influence them to make healthy decisions in their real lives.

I read that we spend upward of three billion hours a week playing computer and video games. Surely we can use some of that to improve learning either in the educational context or the corporate training context, the question is do we? How about we make some addictive games that people will actually learn stuff from? I read about a woman who played Farmville to an extent where she reached a level 111, a level I didn’t imagine existed in the game. Quite evidently it does; this lady is addicted to the game. Why can’t learning games be just as addictive?

My objective in the near future is to design a learning that’s just as addictive. Moral and ethical consideration be damned. As game designers, we can tap deeply into our evolutionary urges, however manipulative that might be. If games can be designed that will ultimately benefit the player by modifying behavior in the long-term, I’m all for it.

As an aside, you might want to look at this TED talk by Tom Chatfield pointing to the same thing.

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Tags: Game Based Learning Learning Games Social Learning Social Learning Games

Comments

  1. Abhijit Kadle December 9, 2010

    Dragan, its interesting that you point to ‘real money’ as a reward, this would be the ultimate ‘carrot’ for individual greed. It makes a lot of sense in the real world to have money as a motivator; organizations spend a lot of money as incentives for individuals to take training and learn from it. If we were to build a model where real money is part of the dynamics, the need for offering such incentives would diminish. Also, this type of monetization fits in well learner psychology.
    As you mention, building a model of learning games that allow for ‘real money’ to be used, coupled with the use of collaborative and competetive dynamics would be unique. Much to think about, the element of money changes my thoughts somewhat. As a gamer, I dont necessarily play for money (unlike gambling), rather I play for self satisfaction and recognition from peers. (leader boards)
    Interesting thoughts; I will post on our progress towards evolving a reasonable social learning game model, stay in touch. Cheers!

  2. Dragan Stankovic December 9, 2010

    I think that your idea on leveraging the capital sins in learning is great. I had similar ideas as well. For example, leveraging “greed” – I was thinking about why gambling is so addictive and was trying to find a model for including real money (to satisfy greed) as a reward for learning a specific subject (money would come from ads, affiliates, etc. and best players (learners) will earn it with their activities).
    I didn’t manage to find the appropriate model but this doesn’t mean I won’t be able to that in the future 🙂
    I am looking forward to read about your progress on this subject.
     

  3. Abhijit Kadle December 8, 2010

    Connie, Cooperative game play exists in the digital world as well. World of Warcraft is among the better examples, thousands of individuals aligning themselves to a common cause, each using their special in-game avatar characteristics to outwit the other group and win.
    Cooperative dynamics can also make sense in learning games, especially in an age where the younger part of the workforce is used to such metaphors of cooperation.
    I’m of the opinion that using cooperative and competitive dynamics together may result in a unique type of learning game. Is that how people learn in real life, through cooperation and competition alternatively?
    Interesting thoughts, and as you mention much to research and think about.

  4. Connie Malamed December 8, 2010

    This is a fascinating approach to designing games, that is, to encourage “capital sins” in the design to make them addictive. I can see how this would work but it also makes me wonder if the opposite would be true. I’ve seen cooperative games (physical games, that is) where participants had a great time engaging in a challenging but cooperative task. And some say that the cooperative side of our nature is what has helped us survive more than the competitive side. All interesting things to research and think about. Thanks for a thoughtful article!
    Connie

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Published on December 8, 2010
Topic : Game Based Learning

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