Keywords

1 Introduction

The idea of gamification is a new approach gradually emphasized in various fields [14, 16]. A globally famous information technology research and advisory company, Gartner, even listed gamification as a noteworthy technology in 2011 [3]. “Gamification” refers to the utilization of human nature of having fun and the inspirational attribute of games changing dull things into fascinating fun. Such an idea has also been applied to enhance learning motivation in education [21, 24], and a lot of large enterprises start to use it for crowdsourcing [15, 23] or training personnel [12]. Akito [1] indicated that gamification was not a temporary fad or trend; the power of games was existed, but modern information environment provided proper time/space situations and media for fulfilling the gamification creativity as well as bringing huge changes to life, thinking, and marketing. According to the literature review on gamification, Aparicio et al. [2], from the aspect of business service, constructed four processes of recyclable gamification; the gamification MDA model [13] was constructed based on the relationship between user experience and designer intention; from the aspect of psychology, the game participation motivation model [20] attempted to find out the factor in the achievement of user behavior [11], from the aspect of economy, constructed the economy model; and, the pleasant model [4] was constructed from the aspect of communications. Accordingly, design researchers should focus on the importance of gamification design, search for proper interdisciplinary theories and knowledge with explanations, deepen the understanding and application of the operation mechanism, and master the meaning and value of effective communication efficiency. This study therefore intends to integrate aesthetic experience from artistic viewpoints, human-machine interactive user experience, and user pleasant model from the aspect of communications to analyze gamification design from the aspect of marketing to make up above situations and problems. The objectives of this study are summarized as below. 1. To apply gamification design to facilitate website design communication efficiency and user experiences. 2. To construct the web experiment to explore the impacts of gamification in the communication efficiency of websites. 3. To propose effective design principles applying gamification design to websites based on the test results of the web experiment.

2 Game and Gamification

Currently accepted definitions of “gamification” contain “attracting users to engage in and solve problems through game thinking processes and game mechanics” [27] and “using computer game elements, in non-game situations, for enhancing user experiences and user engagement” [6]. The objective of gamification is not the game but the strategy to result in interesting and immersive experiences, in non-game situations, with game elements and game mechanics, provide motivation, and attract users’ active engagement to achieve the preset goal. There are various definitions about “game element” and “game mechanics”. Zichermann and Cunningham [27] regarded the so-called “game element” as the basic elements for a game and the basis to lead the game process. “Game mechanics”, on the other hand, was used for optimizing and reinforcing the design of game elements. The MDA game structure proposed by Hunicke et al. [13] was composed of mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics. The discussed “mechanics” was referred to the algorithm leading the entire game to consist game rules and goals through various mechanics. “Dynamics” was the interaction behavior derived from game mechanics. “Aesthetics” was the players’ perception and experiences in the process, i.e. the fun of games. “Game element” mentioned by Zichermann and Cunningham [27], “mechanics element” mentioned by Werbach and Hunter [25], and “mechanics” in MDA structure refer to the basic composition to lead games, including game rules, goals, definitions of winning, and feedback. Specific elements, under “mechanics”, for constructing or reinforcing mechanics might be covered. They were what Werbach and Hunter [25] called “component elements”, e.g. points, badges, levels, and rankings. What is the difference between “gamification” and “game”? Deterding et al. [25] considered that the boundary between game and gamification was tiny and vague and presented experiential and social characters. “Game” was “the form of play” with rules and goals, aiming to provide entertainment. “Gamification”, on the other hand, was a “design strategy” with game elements and mechanics [5] and a method to enhance participation motivation with the fun of games. Gamification was a flexible combination, enhancing the sense of game with game mechanics and various component elements; in other words, it was not necessary to design a complete game for gamification [1]. Referring to the theory of Deterding et al. [5], various game elements in gamification could be regarded as independent bricks which could be freely combined and applied according to purposes and needs; and, the more game elements would more approach to a complete game. Gamification presented flexibility, and the use of game elements and mechanics might appear various combinations and changes; or, game-played fun and gamification effect might be created with merely few game elements and mechanics. Yeh [26] pointed out three major differences between game and gamification. First, the essence of “game” was having fun, while “gamification” was a design strategy. Second, the development of games aimed to provide entertainment value, while the entertainment value of gamification was to enhance motivation and have originally non-game target activities become more attractive. Third, gamification was a flexible combination and created fun with various game component elements and mechanics; it was not necessarily to design a complete game. However, there was the lowest standard for composing gamification, i.e. definite rules and goals.

3 Analysis and Discussion of Gamification from the Aspects of Marketing, Aesthetics, Communication Studies, and Human-Computer Interaction

From the viewpoint of marketing to analyze gamification design, Akito [1] applied the research theories of marketing to analyze gamification design. (1) Just perfect sense of challenge: The design of game levels through pictures or stages had players unconsciously learn the behavior in games. Such a method had users feel that they had the choice, but it was actually special actions arranged in games. (2) Faster and more definite message response: Real-time message responses were given in short period. Definite message responses and the elements of badges, levels, and positions should clearly remind players. (3) Diversified message response: Being the same stimuli would tire people. Games should be designed with difficulties and simplicity, and music or image changes could be included. (4) Structure adjustment: “Strategies” could merely be presented in games, particularly for introducing into games to enhance the fun. (5) Foursquare was the most famous and successful case of gamification in the so-called “incentives drive”. The users checked in the platform and ones often checking in would receive badges (or points), and even became “mayors”, who could enjoy free coffee [19].

To discuss gamification design from “experience aesthetics”, “gamification” means “to attract users engaging in and solving problems through game-based thinking processes and game mechanics” [27] as well as “to enhance user experiences and user engagement with computer game elements in non-game situations” [5]. Apparently, gamification design is covered in user experiences. Dewey’s “experience aesthetics” [7] and Petersen’s “pragmatist aesthetics” [18] are utilized for analyzing users’ aesthetic experience in the gamification experiencing process. According to Dewey’s [7] “art as experience aesthetics”, a person really perceived the existence of beauty merely when he/she experienced aesthetic experiences. Beauty is an integrated perception, covering the entire experiences, rather than certain or detailed perception, and integrates doing and undergoing. Each movement and the successively induced result are connected. Through such doing and undergoing, people could experience the characteristic attribute of beauty. In other words, beauty is perceived through doing and undergoing. Petersen [18], a famous scholar of interactive media, derived “pragmatist aesthetics” from Dewey’s aesthetics [7], which applied multi-dimensional and complete thinking to the rationality of system experience that users and the environment were not two independent things, but would extend the thinking to the integration between participants and the environment and the mutual relationship. For this reason, this study integrates use situations and user experiences to create aesthetic experiences as inviting people to participate in the interactive interface, which could induce perception, for the interaction so that audience could perceive and understand the meaning. Interactive aesthetics relates to inducing imagination, focusing on stimulating and encouraging people presenting the autonomous ideas and perception, after taking spontaneous interaction, as well as the operation and use of interactive artifact interface with personal methods. As a result, designers, when designing aesthetics experience centered gamification interaction, have to think of three key dimensions, namely context, user experiences, and interactive artifact interface, for effective interaction [18]. From the aspect of communication studies, Chang [4] indicated that the characteristics of “non-utilitarian”, “autonomy”, “rule basis”, and “quantitative result” had game behaviors imply intrinsic pleasure. The consumption behaviors in game field were the users’ autonomy under the self-willingness selection, purely for experiencing games, rather than real benefits (non-utilitarian). Besides, the definite rules and actual behavioral result (quantitative result) had game behaviors fill with intrinsic pleasure. Users’ online game pleasure model contained the following four types. (1) Controlled pleasure was affected by text complexity and players’ interaction. (2) Social pleasure included senses of belongingness, closeness, and control. (3) Narrative pleasure was influenced by story beauty and stories. (4) Performance pleasure was to extend and enhance the imagination in the real world.

To analyze user experiences and gamification interactive design with human-computer interaction, “gamification” means to apply computer game elements to non-game situations to enhance user experiences and user engagement [5]. Apparently, gamification design is covered in user experiences. User experiences in the human-computer interaction design are therefore discussed to analyze users’ perception in the gamification experience process. Users’ experiences are similar to a process, in which users use products to generate certain perception and cognition. Hassenzahl [10] mentioned that a designer constructed a product including the content, performance, function, and interactivity, and the product would induce users for contact and interaction. Besides, products covered two characteristics of practice attribute and entertainment attribute. The former referred to the usefulness and effectiveness of products, and the latter referred to the interaction form provided by products or the emotion resulted from more interesting contents as well as the performance to arouse past memories or induce some ideas and self-identification. Finally, the experiences in attraction, pleasure, or satisfaction were generated. User experience design should be a constantly cycled process. Roto [22] considered usefulness as an important item to evaluation user experiences, proposed new coverage of user experiences and discovered that current research did not take the value of user experiences into account, but each experience was meaningful and valuable for users; therefore, the coverage of user experiences should be expanded to the value-centered design. Since user experiences contain how people use and interact with a product (or physical equipment), user experiences cover widely. Desmet and Hekkert [8] defined user experiences covering aesthetics experience, meaning experience, and emotion experience. Hassenzahl and Tractinsky [9] evaluate the factors of users’ internal state, system characteristics, and environment in the quality of user experiences for evaluation and design improvement. A lot of researchers proposed the coverage of user experiences as the evaluation basis. Hassenzahl and Tractinsky [9] pointed out four factors in user experiences. (1) Users’ internal state: expectation, anticipation, needs, motivation, and mood. (2) Design characteristics of system (product or physical equipment): complexity, purpose, usefulness, and functionality. (3) Context or environment: time, occasions, and contexts for the interaction between users and system. (4) Interaction of process: organizational/social background, meaningful activity, and voluntary use.

4 Research on Gamification and Communication Efficiency of Web Design

Gamification aims to have players engage in tasks and encourage desirable behaviors [19]. Zichermann and Cunningham [27] defined gamification as the process of game-based thinking and the utilization of game mechanics for users’ engaging in and solving problems. Based on above definitions, Nicholson [17] proposed three applications to construct user-centered meaningful gamification, allow users perceiving the fun of tasks, and really internalize experiences. Those were explained with the possible effects of external motivation induced by reward mechanics. (1) Universal design for learning: Universal design for learning came from education, aiming to have designers establish course contents suitable for multiple learning groups. (2) Organismic integration theory: Organismic integration theory explained the integration of activity into personal self-perception with external motivation to have users’ self-identified goals be meaningful and to better appear autonomous behaviors. (3) Situational relevance and situated motivational affordance: Situational relevant mainly expected to involve in users, and situated motivational affordance came from automatic functional affordance theory [5]. Users would be induced the motivation by a system to satisfy the motivation needs merely when the background and viewpoints conforming to the system. (4) Player-generated content: The idea of player-generated content came from “Gaming 2.0” in research on games. “Second life” was the game to achieve the principle. Players constructed more than one games to develop a system, allowing users randomly revising the games and developing contents. From above literature review, it is discovered that the coverage of pleasure experience in communication studies corresponds to user experiences in human-computer interaction and could better enhance experiences to pleasure, satisfaction, sociality, and learnability. From the research on human-computer interaction, user experiences contained users’ objectiveness (usefulness) and the subjective psychological perception, and the pleasure experience module in communication studies applied to network interaction might result in aesthetics experience, meaningful experience, and emotional experience. This study discovers that the integration of gamification design, user experiences in human-computer interaction, and experience aesthetics theory could improve and reinforce the communication efficiency of web design and promote user experiences.

5 Method

To discuss the effects of the integration of gamification on web communication efficiency, the web experiment is constructed for this study. Based on the content in Chu Ming Art Museum in Taipei City, a control web (without integration of gamification) and an experimental web (with the integration of gamification) are constructed with identical information content. Step 1: Construct experimented webs of control web (without integration of gamification) and experimental web (with integration of gamification). Step 2: Test experimented webs and recruit users to participate and complete tasks on such two webs. Step 3: Questionnaire survey is preceded on users and semi-structured interviews aim to find out users’ web experience and perception by evaluating following dimensions. Ease of use, efficiency, comprehension, pleasure, satisfaction, and attraction motivation. Step 4: Discuss and analyze the effect of the use of gamification on the communication efficiency of web design, according to above test results, questionnaire, and interviews. Step 5: Conclude the principle of applying gamification to web design to enhance effective communication.

6 Construction the Web Experiment

6.1 Test Subject and Test Process and Step

The test subjects include 9 people aged 22–25, with college degree, and 6 people aged 26–30, with graduate degree. The computer lab DA203 of Graduate School & Department of Creative Design, National Yunlin University of Science and Technology, is used for the test with desktop computers and interview. First, the users are requested to complete the designed tasks and then fill in the questionnaire; finally, they are proceeded SUS test.

6.2 Construction of Control Web and Experimental Web and the Difference

Control web refers to not integrating gamification into the web design, while the characteristics of gamification are integrated into the experimental web design. The characteristics of gamification and the differences between two webs are explained as following Table 1.

Table 1. Comparison between web design with gamification and without gamification
Full size table

6.3 Task Design, Questionnaire Design, and Questions in SUS Test

Each task designed in this study presents balanced difficulties. The time from beginning to the end of tasks is calculated by the researcher. The task contents are referred to Table 2, and the questionnaire contents, which are measured with Likert 5-point scale, are referred to Table 3.

Table 2. Task design
Full size table
Table 3. Questionnaire design
Full size table

SUS method is applied to gauge the users’ response. During this experiment, users are asked to fill in a survey sheet which is called SUS (System Usability Scale). According to the related international usability evaluation research, SUS method is an efficient method to understand the users. System Usability Scale is developed at Digital Equipment Corp in 1986. It consists of ten items. One of the items is adapted by replacing “system” with “website”. Total 10 questions are included in SUS, as followings, and measured with Likert 5-point scale.

  1. 1.

    I think that I would like to use this web frequently.

  2. 2.

    I found the web unnecessarily complex.

  3. 3.

    I thought the web was easy to use.

  4. 4.

    I think that I would need the support of a technical person to be able to use this web.

  5. 5.

    I found the various functions in this web were well integrated.

  6. 6.

    I thought there was too much inconsistency in this web.

  7. 7.

    I would imagine that most people would learn to use this web very quickly.

  8. 8.

    I found the web very cumbersome to use.

  9. 9.

    I felt very confident using the web.

  10. 10.

    I needed to learn a lot of things before I could get going with this web.

7 Result and Analysis

7.1 Task Test Result and Analysis

From Table 4, the time for users completing the first task on experimental web is shorter than it on control web. It presents the same on the second task. Table 5 reflects the significantly different performance of users on the two tasks between experimental web and control web (p < 0.05). Apparently, the integration of gamification into webs could effectively enhance efficiency.

Table 4. Task 1 timing result in test
Full size table
Table 5. Task test
Full size table

7.2 Response to Questionnaire Design and Analysis

From Table 6, users on experimental web show higher comprehension, pleasure, satisfaction, and attraction motivation than those on control web. Table 7 reveals that remarkable differences in users’ comprehension (p < 0.05, Sig = .052), pleasure (p < 0.05, Sig = .000), satisfaction (p < 0.05, Sig = .012), and attraction motivation (p < 0.05, Sig = .014). Apparently, integrating gamification into webs could enhance comprehension, pleasure, satisfaction, and attraction motivation.

Table 6. Responses to questionnaire design
Full size table
Table 7. Responses to questionnaire design
Full size table

7.3 SUS Test Result and Analysis

SUS scores reflect the overall ease of use of webs. Research pointed out the failure of ease of use when the SUS score was lower than the mean 68. From above test results, each testee on experimental web (with the integration of gamification) appears higher scores than one on control web (without the integration of gamification). On the experimental web, the SUS mean of all testees is 79, while it appears 63.3 on control web. Apparently, experimental web (with the integration of gamification) is easier to use for users.

8 Discussion and Conclusion

Regarding ease of use, the ease of use of web integrated with gamification is enhanced, according to users’ SUS performance (Table 8). The integration of gamification into webs could facilitate efficiency, according to users’ task performance (Tables 4 and 5). The questionnaire responses reveal that users are enhanced the comprehension, pleasure, satisfaction, and attraction motivation (Tables 6 and 7). Overall speaking, the application of gamification to web design could enhance communication efficiency. However, four core points are proposed in this study to properly integrate gamification into webs for enhancing effective communication, including comprehending users’ cultural and social context, understanding users’ experiences and experience design theory and initiating user behavior, constructing interactive artifact, and evaluating the communication efficiency of gamification-integrated webs (test).

Table 8. Test results in SUS
Full size table

  • Comprehending Users’ Cultural and Social Context

User-centered design has been gradually emphasized. A satisfactory and popular system in which users engage and feel being supported could be established when taking users’ socio-psychological needs and background context, the meaning of games, and personal differences into account of gamification system design.

  • Understanding Users’ Experiences and experience design theory as well as initiating user behavior: (1) Designers should integrate actions, challenges, and achievements. (2) Designers are able to initiate the motivation of user behavior. Intrinsic motivation: competence, autonomy, and relatedness. Extrinsic motivation: badges, points, and incentives.

  • Constructing Interactive Artifact: Game design principles, game mechanics, game models, game patterns, and game interface design elements.

  • Evaluating the enhancement of web communication efficiency with gamification: (1) Human-computer interaction theory could be used for usefulness: effectiveness, learnability, and comprehension. (2) Aesthetics experience and communication studies theory could be used for entertainment: pleasure, control, sociality, and narration. (3) Motivation theory in psychology could be applied to satisfaction: competence, autonomy, relatedness. (4) Motivation theory in psychology could be applied to motivation: achievement, engagement.