Psychophysiology in games

Psychophysiology is the study of the relationship between psychology and its physiological manifestations. That relationship is of particular importance for both game design and ultimately gameplaying. Players’ psychophysiology offers a gateway towards a better understanding of playing behavior and experience. That knowledge can, in turn, be beneficial for the player as it allows designers to make better games for them; either explicitly by altering the game during play or implicitly during the game design process. This chapter argues for the importance of physiology for the investigation of player affect in games, reviews the current state of the art in sensor technology and outlines the key phases for the application of psychophysiology in games.The work is supported, in part, by the EU-funded FP7 ICT iLearnRWproject (project no: 318803).peer-reviewe

A Reflection on Economic Uncertainty and Fertility in Europe: The Narrative Framework

none5openVignoli, Daniele; Guetto, Raffaele; Bazzani, Giacomo; Pirani, Elena; Minello, AlessandraVignoli, Daniele; Guetto, Raffaele; Bazzani, Giacomo; Pirani, Elena; Minello, Alessandr

Mitigating knowledge decay from instruction with voluntary use of an adaptive learning system

Knowledge decays across breaks in instruction. Learners lack the metacognition to self-assess their knowledge decay and effectively self-direct review, as well as lacking interactive exercises appropriate to their individual knowledge level. Adaptive learning systems offer the potential to mitigate these issues, by providing open learner models to facilitate learner’s understanding of their knowledge levels and by presenting personalized practice exercises. The current study analyzes differences in knowledge decay between learners randomly assigned to an intervention where they could use an adaptive system during a long gap between courses, compared with a control condition. The experimental condition used the Personal Assistant for Life-Long Learning (PAL3), a tablet-based adaptive learning system integrating multiple intelligent tutoring systems and conventional learning resources. It contained electronics content relevant to the experiment participants, Navy sailors who graduated from apprentice electronics courses (A-School) awaiting assignment to their next training (C-School). The study was conducted over one month, collecting performance data with a counterbalanced pre-, mid-, and post-test. The control condition exhibited the expected decay. The PAL3 condition showed a significant difference from the control, with no significant knowledge decay in their overall knowledge, despite substantial variance in usage for PAL3 (e.g., most of overall use in the first week, with fewer participants engaging as time went on). Interestingly, while overall decay was mitigated in PAL3, this result was primarily through gains in some knowledge offsetting losses in other knowledge. Overall, these results indicate that adaptive study tools can help prevent knowledge decay, even with voluntary usage

Measurement and Analysis of Learner’s Motivation in Game-Based E-Learning

Computer games started to be integrated in the learning process in order to bridge the gap between the new learner generation and the traditional learning process. However, today’s game-based e-learning environments do not provide different types of adaptation, with learners receiving mostly “one size fits all” educational games despite the existing differences between them in terms of learner knowledge, motivation, etc. In this context, game-based e-learning can lead to demotivated learners. Therefore, there is a need for adaptation strategies. In order to make adaptation possible, real-time assessment of the game-play process as well as of the learning process is needed. Since learner motivation plays an important role in both the learning and the gaming process, and can easily change, new techniques for automated assessment of learner motivation are needed. This chapter presents current trends in game-based e-learning assessment in general focusing on the assessment of learner motivation in particular. Methods for gathering information on player/learner motivation are also presented. Information on learner motivation can be gathered (1) through dialog-based interaction, (2) through game-play-based interaction and/or (3) through additional equipment. This chapter also proposes four generic metrics for the measurement and analysis of motivation in game-based e-learning based on metrics that were used in e-learning. Each metric is presented and its usage and interpretation in gaming-based e-learning are discussed