research-article

Improving participation and learning with gamification

Authors:

Gabriel Barata,

Daniel GonçalvesAuthors Info & Claims

Gamification '13: Proceedings of the First International Conference on Gameful Design, Research, and Applications

Pages 10 - 17

https://doi.org/10.1145/2583008.2583010

Published: 02 October 2013 Publication History

Abstract

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.

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Cited By

Costuchen AReyes-Torres ATordera Yllescas J(2025)Analysis of Movie Trailers Based on a WSH Game PrototypeLiteracy Policies for Equity and Inclusion10.4018/979-8-3693-8427-5.ch001(1-24)Online publication date: 28-Feb-2025
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-8427-5.ch001
Cubillos CMellado RNóbile C(2025)Is Gamification Effective for Women Who Wish to Learn Computer Programming?Human Behavior and Emerging Technologies10.1155/hbe2/64106542025:1Online publication date: 6-Feb-2025
https://doi.org/10.1155/hbe2/6410654
Moreno A(2024)Enhancing the Learning and Application of Knowledge in University StudentsPractices and Implementation of Gamification in Higher Education10.4018/979-8-3693-0716-8.ch004(71-87)Online publication date: 26-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-0716-8.ch004
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Index Terms

Improving participation and learning with gamification
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Human computer interaction (HCI)
    1. HCI design and evaluation methods

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Published In

cover image ACM Other conferences

Gamification '13: Proceedings of the First International Conference on Gameful Design, Research, and Applications

October 2013

148 pages

ISBN:9781450328159

DOI:10.1145/2583008

General Chairs:
Lennart E. Nacke
University of Ontario Institute of Technology, Canada
,
Kevin Harrigan
University of Waterloo, Canada
,
Neil Randall
University of Waterloo, Canada

Copyright © 2013 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than the author(s) must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected].

Sponsors

UWATERLOO: University of Waterloo
IMMERSe: IMMERSe Network
Waterloo Stratford Campus: University of Waterloo Stratford Campus
University of Ontario Institute of Technology

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Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 02 October 2013

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Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia

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Gamification '13

Sponsor:

UWATERLOO
IMMERSe
Waterloo Stratford Campus

Gamification '13: Gameful Design, Research, and Applications

October 2 - 4, 2013

Ontario, Toronto, Canada

Acceptance Rates

Gamification '13 Paper Acceptance Rate 9 of 25 submissions, 36%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 9 of 25 submissions, 36%

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Cited By

Costuchen AReyes-Torres ATordera Yllescas J(2025)Analysis of Movie Trailers Based on a WSH Game PrototypeLiteracy Policies for Equity and Inclusion10.4018/979-8-3693-8427-5.ch001(1-24)Online publication date: 28-Feb-2025
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-8427-5.ch001
Cubillos CMellado RNóbile C(2025)Is Gamification Effective for Women Who Wish to Learn Computer Programming?Human Behavior and Emerging Technologies10.1155/hbe2/64106542025:1Online publication date: 6-Feb-2025
https://doi.org/10.1155/hbe2/6410654
Moreno A(2024)Enhancing the Learning and Application of Knowledge in University StudentsPractices and Implementation of Gamification in Higher Education10.4018/979-8-3693-0716-8.ch004(71-87)Online publication date: 26-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-0716-8.ch004
Bernardino I(2024)The Potential of Gamification in the Multigenerational Learning OrganizationsCreating Learning Organizations Through Digital Transformation10.4018/979-8-3693-0556-0.ch008(137-155)Online publication date: 9-Feb-2024
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-0556-0.ch008
Trueba CRemuzgo L(2024)¿Es posible motivar a los estudiantes sin darles incentivos sobre su calificación final en la asignatura?Is it possible to motivate students without offering them incentives tied to their final grade in the subject?European Public & Social Innovation Review10.31637/epsir-2025-64910(1-17)Online publication date: 28-Nov-2024
https://doi.org/10.31637/epsir-2025-649
Navas Romero C(2024)Transforming Higher Education: The Power of Educational BreakoutsTransformando la Educación Superior: El Poder de los Breakouts EducativosEuropean Public & Social Innovation Review10.31637/epsir-2024-9619(1-19)Online publication date: 29-Oct-2024
https://doi.org/10.31637/epsir-2024-961
Mallick AWaheed S(2024)Learning Urogenital Diseases in Oddity (LUDO)—a gamification-based innovation for learning urogenital diseases in emergency medicineInternational Journal of Emergency Medicine10.1186/s12245-023-00567-017:1Online publication date: 9-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12245-023-00567-0
Kuang ELi MFan MShinohara K(2024)Enhancing UX Evaluation Through Collaboration with Conversational AI Assistants: Effects of Proactive Dialogue and TimingProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642168(1-16)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3613904.3642168
Strousopoulos PTroussas CKrouska ASgouropoulou C(2024)The Gamification Advantage: Innovating Education through Engagement2024 9th South-East Europe Design Automation, Computer Engineering, Computer Networks and Social Media Conference (SEEDA-CECNSM)10.1109/SEEDA-CECNSM63478.2024.00045(204-208)Online publication date: 20-Sep-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/SEEDA-CECNSM63478.2024.00045
Lepe-Salazar FCortés-Álvarez T(2024)Towards an effective methodology for the integral gamification of classesMultimedia Tools and Applications10.1007/s11042-024-19846-wOnline publication date: 18-Jul-2024
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-024-19846-w
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