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Games
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Serious games use instructional and video game elements for nonentertainment purposes. Serious games attempt to create instructionally sound and relevant learning experiences for a wide variety of audiences and industries. The author contends that for serious games to be effective, instructional designers and video game designers need to understand how the game characteristics, competition and goals, rules, challenges, choices, and fantasy, used in both edutainment and serious games, can influence motivation and facilitate learning.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Scholars, educators, and media designers are increasingly interested in whether and how digital games might contribute to civic learning. However, there are three main barriers to advancing understanding of games' potential for civic education: the current practices of formal schooling, a dearth of evidence about what kinds of games best inspire learning about public life, and divergent paradigms of civic engagement. In response, this article develops a conceptual framework for how games might foster civic learning of many kinds. The authors hypothesize that the most effective games for civic learning will be those that best integrate game play and content, that help players make connections between their individual actions and larger social structures, and that link ethical and expedient reasoning. This framework suggests an agenda for game design and research that could illuminate whether and how games can be most fruitfully incorporated into training and education for democratic citizenship and civic leadership.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Acts of interpersonal touch - a touch shared between two people are used by couples to communicate in a simple and emotionally intimate way. In this paper, we argue that the intimacy afforded by acts of interpersonal touch can be used in computer entertainment to support enjoyable and engaging activities for couples. To support this notion, we have developed Matchmaker; a two-player, cooperative tabletop video game based on themes of love and romance. Matchmaker's gameplay is directly controlled by a set of collaborative tabletop interaction techniques, as well as by acts of interpersonal touch between its players. In this paper we present a detailed description of Matchmaker's design and the results of an exploratory user suggesting that Matchmaker is enjoyable to play and that its use of interpersonal touch contributes to players' enjoyment.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
This paper discusses a specific customization technology Psychological Customization - which enables the customization of information presented on a computer-based system in real-time and its application to manipulating emotions when playing computer games. The possibilities of customizing different elements of games to manipulate emotions are presented and a definition of emotionally adaptive games is given. A psychophysiologically adaptive game is discussed as an example of emotionally adapted games.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
In modern computer games, 'bots' - Intelligent realistic agents play a prominent role in success of a game in market. Typically, bots are modeled using finite-state machine and then programmed via simple conditional statements which are hard-coded in bots logic. Since these bots have become quite predictable to an experienced games player, she might lose her interest in game. We present a model of bots using BDI agents, which will show more human-like behavior, more believable and will provide more realistic feel to the game. These bots will use the inputs from actual game players to specify her Beliefs, Desires, and Intentions while game playing.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
MyFootballClub (MFC) is a popular computer game, Web site, online networking experiment, business model, and an actual soccer Club. This article uses MFC to address the question of how networked media sport is reshaping the media sports cultural complex (Rowe, 2004). Our aim is to show how the professionalization and mediatization of sport has created a longing to reconstruct a kind of communitas around supporter participation in the ownership and running of their team, We conclude by suggesting that it is now time to think less in terms of the longstanding relationship between sport and media, and more about sport as media given the increasing interpenetration of digital media content, sport, and networked information and communications technologies.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Uncertainty may be an important component of the motivation provided by learning games, especially when associated with gaming rather than learning. Three studies are reported that explore the influence of gaming uncertainty on engagement with computer-based learning games. In the first study, children (10-11 years) played a simple maths quiz. Participants chose their preferred reward for a correct answer prior to seeing each question. They could either receive a single point or toss an animated coin to receive 2 points for heads or none for tails. A preference for the uncertain option was revealed and this increased during the quiz. The second study explored the discourse around learning when pairs of participants (13-14 years) competed against the computer in a science quiz. Progress depended on the acquisition of facts but also on the outcomes of throwing dice. Discourse was characterised by a close intermingling of learning and gaming talk without salient problematic constructions regarding fairness when losing points due to gaming uncertainty. A final experiment explored whether, in this type of game, the uncertainty provided by the gaming component could influence players' affective response to the learning component. Electrodermal activity (EDA) of 16 adults was measured while they played the quiz with and without the element of chance provided by the dice. Results showed EDA when answering questions was increased by inclusion of gaming uncertainty. Findings are discussed in terms of the potential benefits of combining gaming uncertainty with learning and directions for further research in this area are outlined.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
Background Due to improved ergonomics and dexterity, robotic surgery is promoted as being easily performed by surgeons with no special skills necessary. We tested this hypothesis by measuring IQ elements, computer gaming skills, general dexterity with chopsticks, and evaluating laparoscopic experience in correlation to performance ability with the da Vinci (R) robot.Methods Thirty-four individuals were tested for robotic dexterity, IQ elements, computer-gaming skills and general dexterity. Eighteen surgically inexperienced and 16 laparoscopically trained surgeons were included. Each individual performed three different tasks with the da Vinci surgical system and their times were recorded. An IQ test (elements: logical thinking, 3D imagination and technical understanding) was completed by each participant. Computer skills were tested with a simple computer game (hand-eye coordination) and general dexterity was evaluated by the ability to use chopsticks.Results We found no correlation between logical thinking, 3D imagination and robotic skills. Both computer gaming and general dexterity showed a slight but non-significant improvement in performance with the da Vinci robot (p > 0.05). A significant correlation between robotic skills, technical understanding and laparoscopic experience was observed (p < 0.05).Conclusions The data support the conclusion that there are no significant correlations between robotic performance and logical thinking, 3D understanding, computer gaming skills and general dexterity. A correlation between robotic skills and technical understanding may exist. Laparoscopic experience seems to be the strongest predictor of performance with the da Vinci surgical system. Generally, it appears difficult to determine non-surgical predictors for robotic surgery. Copyright (C) 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
OBJECTIVE. Given the increase in screen media targeted at the very young, the purpose of this study was to examine preschooler parents' knowledge about expert recommendations for young children's screen media experience, their knowledge of specific screen media ratings, their beliefs about screen media effects, and actual monitoring practices.METHOD. Parents of 94 children < 5 years of age (mean age: 2.95 years) were surveyed. Questionnaires were distributed in day care centers and completed at the parents' convenience. The questionnaire included background questions about parental education, age and gender of child, and parents' perceptions of their child's favorite television show and favorite video or computer game. Eleven multiple-choice questions assessed the respondent's knowledge of expert recommendations for screen media for preschoolers and the meaning of television and video game content ratings. Fourteen questions addressed the typical amount of their preschooler's screen media exposure, parental rules regarding screen media use, and parents' beliefs about appropriate use of screen media for preschoolers.RESULTS. Preschoolers were exposed to an average of similar to 12 hours of screen media in a typical week. Parents believe that media do have either short- or long-term effects on preschoolers. Performance on factual questions was poor (mean score: 2.83 of 11). In particular, only 34% of the parents correctly identified the expert recommendation for children > 2 years of age.CONCLUSIONS. Parents should continue to be educated about the need for preschoolers to participate in activities that promote language development, socialization, imagination, and physical activity. Although professionals should work to improve the ratings, and ultimately to implement a universal ratings system for all screen media, parents need to be encouraged to improve their understanding of current recommendations for screen media exposure and television and video game ratings. Pediatrics 2009;123:981-988
New entry in Digiplay games research bibliography:
In this paper we describe a two-week residential summer game camp for rising 9(th) and 10(th) grade students and a four-week high school teacher professional development course. We present survey results that indicate our approach results in increased computer programming knowledge and self-confidence for both students and teachers. Our project aims to use a holistic game creation approach to increase student interest in computer science by directly teaching to students in a summer camp, instructing the teachers during a 4-week professional development course, and finally by supporting teachers as they use our curriculum in their high schools.
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