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Fostering autonomous motivation: a deeper evaluation of gamified learning

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Abstract

Research in gamified learning is still needed to expound how gamification may be employed to realistically yield positive effects on learning motivation. It is essential to evaluate whether gamification can foster autonomous forms of motivation, such as intrinsic motivation, which has been related to learning persistence and performance quality, instead of non-autonomous extrinsic motivation, that has been shown to be unsustainable or at worse, harmful to learning. To explore this, the current study investigated how gamified learning affected various motivational dimensions such as the sense of competence, autonomy, valuation, intrinsic motivation, identified regulation and external regulation to provide a clearer picture of the motivational influence of gamification. This study involved a learning activity that was gamified in a long-term context. The findings showed that gamifying a non-graded learning activity increased the sense of autonomy and intrinsic motivation. Interestingly, the findings showed that gamification reduced non-autonomous motivation in an examination-oriented course. Nevertheless, gamified learning did not yield significant effects on the sense of competence and valuation. The relationships between the various motivational dimensions were discussed in this paper.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Correspondence to Adele H. T. Kam.

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Kam, A.H.T., Umar, I.N. Fostering autonomous motivation: a deeper evaluation of gamified learning. J Comput High Educ 36, 368–388 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12528-023-09358-1

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