Gamification, citizen science, and civic technologies: In search of the common good

In this paper, we discuss the importance of gameplay as a valuable tool in citizen sensing initiatives aimed at enabling creative collaboration and civic engagement. We present a review of selected citizen science and civic technologies’ projects highlighting an emerging culture of massive collaborative initiatives that make use of crowdsourcing, enabling users to voluntarily contribute their time, effort and resources towards scientific research and civic issues. Moreover, we discuss how these initiatives could benefit from the inclusion of gameplay in their interaction processes. For that matter, we present a gamified citizen sensing project we are devising for users to enter and retrieve information on commercially available food products which contain ingredients associated with an increased risk of cancer and other diseases. Through gameplay, we expect to crowdsource an open database of potentially unhealthy food products, raising awareness among consumers about the risks of certain artificial additives. Finally, we argue that the use of gamification processes can engage voluntary participation in initiatives aimed at citizenship – including those which demand complex and repetitive tasks for the collection of data – and call for a more ethical, critical, and meaningful use of these new potential technologies, and for greater awareness of our new civic responsibilities.Keywords: interaction design, gamification, citizen sensing, mobile applications, artificial food additives

The Potential for Using Loyalty Rewards and Incentives Programs to Encourage Transit Ridership and Regional Transportation and Land Use Integration

Transit smart cards can be used as a tool for increasing transit ridership, increasing retail sales in transit-oriented developments (TODs) and eventually, increasing opportunities for retail development in TODs. Instead of providing separate loyalty rewards for each store, or chain of stores, such cards would provide loyalty rewards—in several possible forms, including free transit ride credits, cash rewards, retail purchase discounts, sweepstakes rewards—to all transit riders who patronize TOD retail businesses. Additional rewards could also be given to transit riders who live, work, and shop in TODs, and even to riders who take transit for specific shopping trips in TODs. In this way, smart cards and transit loyalty programs could become not only useful tools for increasing transit ridership, but also tools for targeted economic development of individual TODs, a means to increase economic opportunities and equity for low-income residents and shoppers in inner-city commercial zones, and in their most fully-realized expression, as tools for regional planners to concentrate retail, services and housing in priority development areas consistent with smart-growth planning principles. This literature review and case study research resulted in the identification of a number of practical lessons, and promising directions for future research: 1. There is a lack of research linking transit smart cards, transit ridership, and shopping behavior in TODs. 2. It is important to retain existing transit riders (reducing ridership “churn”), potentially through the use of loyalty rewards programs and incentives programs to keep these riders or win back those who have given it up. 3. There is both need and potential for rebranding transit’s public image. 4. There are risks of overreach when implementing a transit loyalty rewards and incentives program. 5. There is high potential of incentives and loyalty rewards programs in building transit ridership, TOD, and beyond

Envisioning the future village: the role of digital technology in supporting more inclusive visions in the neighbourhood planning process

This thesis presents the development of a digitally aided Collaborative Envisioning Framework, to support disenfranchised young people in contributing to a ‘shared vision’ of their community’s future. Drawing from the research areas of planning, design, collaboration and envisioning, this study sought to address the existing democratic deficit in local decision making activities, by utilising the new potentials of digital technologies. The research aim was to support communities, particularly disengaged young people, in becoming involved with decision-making activities, namely generating a shared vision for a neighbourhood plan. Since the radical policy changes to the National Planning Policy Framework and Localism Act 2011, members of the public have been handed increased responsibility and accountability in contributing to the local decisions affecting them. However, the tools and resources have been criticized for not engaging and including all sectors of the public, particularly young people (who arguably have the most to gain, or lose, as a result of decisions made). Using community and neighbourhood planning as a microcosm of a larger problem, this study looked towards the potentials of digital tools as a way to address this democratic deficit. To discover whether they offered anything more than existing tools, by helping young people to contribute to the generation of a ‘shared vision’ (a requisite of a neighbourhood planning application). It also addressed the assumption that the public had an understanding of what creating a ‘shared vision’ entailed, and had the skills and knowledge required to create one. It firstly identified envisioning as a design activity, which needs creativity, imagination, empathy, collaboration, communication and deliberation, and then identified ‘designable factors’ such as processes, tools (digital and non-digital), environments, and services which are able to support these, focusing on which were most suitable for the young audience. The research also explored behavior and motivation theories which guided the design of an envisioning framework. To achieve this aim, a constructive design research methodology was adopted consisting of a designed artefact - ‘The Collaborative Envisioning Framework’ which was utlised throughout numerous workshops. The interactions between the workshop participants and the envisioning framework generated multiple sets of qualitative data, which were analysed and interpreted to form the next iteration of the framework. The research demonstrates that existing tools and resources aimed at supporting inclusivity and meaningful visions for neighbourhood plans are not, in their current form, adequate to firstly, engage the diverse groups of people they should be including, and secondly, to support a generative, creative activity of envisioning, and suggests that the use of digital tools (namely Ageing Booth App, Morfo App, and Minecraft) offer something new. The original contributions to knowledge are: an advancement of constructive design research methodology; contributions to the discourse surrounding the purpose and value of visons within community planning; and a practical ‘Collaborative Envisioning Framework’ which can be followed by public sector and private organisations who seek to support communities in producing ‘visons’ for their community

OmaStadi budgeting game - An evaluation framework for working towards more inclusive participation through design games

Today, the notion of participatory budgeting has been implemented in more than 1500 cities worldwide. In Finland, the City of Helsinki’s new participatory budgeting process, OmaStadi, opens up an annual budget of 4.4 million euros to implement proposals suggested by citizens. For this process, the city has developed a design game, the OmaStadi game, to facilitate these proposals. The main goal of the game is to make participation in OmaStadi more inclusive. Therefore, it is designed to support qualities such as equal participation, improved discussion, creativity, citizen learning, and city perception. The fact that the game is specifically designed to be played by citizens as part of a participatory budgeting process, makes it among the first of its kind in the world. Thus, research into its impact are consequently unique. This thesis evaluates the OmaStadi game’s impact on the overall inclusiveness of the first year of participatory budgeting. This is done using a constructive and learning-oriented approach that focuses on the challenges (limiting factors), strengths (enabling factors), and achievements (impact) of the game. Research data are collected through qualitative interviews with five civil servants in charge of facilitating OmaStadi, the main designer of the game, and four of the participating citizens. The impact of the game is analysed using five identified goals and subsequently examined using three democratic criteria for evaluating participatory processes: participation (inclusion), political equality, and quality of deliberation. The evaluation results are then used to develop a broader evaluation framework with guidelines for how to plan, implement, and analyse further evaluation of the OmaStadi game. The research findings indicate that the game seemingly supports the overall inclusiveness of the broader budgeting process. Further, it contributes to making the gameplay, discussion, and idea development more equal for the citizens. Lastly, the game was seen to strengthen the discussion between citizens, improve the creativity of these, and enhance the overall quality of their proposals. However, in terms of quality of deliberation, high deliberative quality seems hindered by certain players’ strong attachment to their own ideas or tendency to give away their power very easily