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The introduction of gamification of governmental services is a topic of interest to policy makers and gamification researchers and practitioners alike. Nonetheless, governmental gamification still remains an understudied area, despite the practical governmental gamification initiatives already taking place, facing increased implementation risks from the lack of guiding implementation principles. Such risks and lack of unified guidelines for governmental gamification necessitates the examination of governmental gamification from the perspective of existing knowledge to synthesize key knowledge fathered on its implementation. This article examines existing research in order to provide guidelines for applying gamification in government services. By using a combination of research on gamification in civic engagement and the Gamified Service Framework of Klapztein and Cipolla, the article creates a basic roadmap for recognizing factors that need to be considered when applying gamification techniques and methods in government services and the public sector in general.

With the increasing provenance of hedonic and social information systems, systems are observed to employ other forms of feedback and design than purely informational in order to increase user engagement and motivation. Three principle classes of motivational design pursuing user engagement have become increasingly established; gamification, quantified-self and social networking. This study investigates how the perceived prominence of these three design classes in users’ use of information system facilitate experiences of affective, informational and social feedback as well as user’s perceived benefits from a system and their continued use intentions. We employ survey data (N = 167) gathered from users of HeiaHeia; an exercise encouragement system that employs features belonging to the three design classes. The results indicate that gamification is positively associated with experiences of affective feedback, quantified-self with experiences of both affective and informational feedback and social networking with experiences of social feedback. Experiences of affective feedback are further strongly associated with user perceived benefits and continued use intentions, whereas experiences of informational feedback are only associated with continued use intentions. Experiences of social feedback had no significant relationship with neither. The findings provide practical insights into how systems can be designed to facilitate different types of feedback that increases users’ engagement, benefits and intentions to continue the use of a system.

Background.Gamification is concerned with the utilization of motivational affordances that create value-adding experience in the design of services. It has many applications in different fields and has been shown to be a good design methodology to influence motivation and behavioral change. Civic engagement and its online platforms could benefit from gamification, as these areas suffer from low engagement levels, thus defeating the purpose for which they are created. Purpose. There is a lack of understanding of how civic engagement platforms should be gamified to sustain active engagement and assist in community building, while also fulfilling their operational objectives. This article aims to provide a theoretical framework and guidelines for the gamification of civic engagement platforms. Contribution. A theoretical framework for the gamification of civic engagement platforms is presented, drawing upon self-determination theory and democratic deliberation theory. Through this work, we also identify future research directions and highlight the need for research on related subjects.

Electronic democracy (e-democracy) is a way to engage citizens and politicians with their government through the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICTs) tools. Although the concept of e-democracy has been growing during the past years, few studies have examined how to achieve success of e-democracy via social networks. This research is answering the following question: How social networks support the local government decision making to enhance e-democracy? To answer the research question, a proposed model was introduced and a survey method was employed. Findings showed that governments could use social networks to facilitate awareness of information among citizens and support citizens in building their communities. Furthermore, social networks would help to facilitate deliberation among citizens. However, this should be supported with appropriate level of involvements from the government side in the discussion to provide support. Through this, governments could enhance their decision making.

Storification is an emerging pedagogical technique, albeit research lacks the understanding of its benefits and detriments. This study examines a school in the US that has storified majority of their learning environment into various fictional and nonfictional worlds for students to learn in and for teachers to incorporate in their pedagogy. 11 educational staff and 79 students were interviewed, and classes were observed for 10 days to ground a theory of storified pedagogy. Storification, employed in physical learning environments and in teaching practices, supported pedagogy and decreased student misconduct at the school. Storified pedagogy empowered students through story morals and a sense of transportation, and enabled classrooms to turn into personalized spaces, enhancing the school experience and students’ academic performance. publishedVersion

There is no doubt that various social media services shape the ways in which we approach our daily lives. The ubiquitous nature of these services, afforded by mobile devices, means that we can take them with us wherever we go — including when we attend live events. Uncovering why individuals use social media during live events can help improve event organization, marketing, and the experiences of attendees. Our understanding of the motivations for using social media during live events is, however, still lacking in depth, especially in regard to emerging live events such as esports. This study aims to answer the question: what motivates the use of social media during live esports events? Data was gathered via a survey (N=255) at the ‘Assembly 2016’ LAN-event, a major live esports event. We examine the relationships between using various social media services and the motivations for esports spectating, through the Motivation Scale for Sports Consumption. While the results indicate that using social media services while attending Assembly 2016 was quite popular, it seemed that in many cases social media usage was a distraction from esports spectating, a core activity of the event. The results provide implications as to how marketers of live esports events should encourage or control usage of social media by attendees. acceptedVersion

Systems and services we employ in our daily life have increasingly been augmented with motivational designs which fall under the classes of (1) gamification, (2) quantified-self and (3) social networking features that aim to help users reach their goals via motivational enforcement. However, users differ in terms of their orientation and focus toward goals and in terms of the attributes of their goals. Therefore, different classes of motivational design may have a differential fit for users. Being able to distinguish the goal profiles of users, motivational design could be better tailored. Therefore, in this study we investigate how different goal foci (outcome and focus), goals orientation (mastery, proving, and avoiding), and goal attributes (specificity and difficulty) are associated with perceived importance of gamification, social networking and quantified-self features. We employ survey data ($$\mathrm{N}=167$$N=167) from users of HeiaHeia; a popular exercise encouragement app. Results indicate that goal-setting related factors of users and attributes of goals are connected with users' preference over motivational design classes. In particular, the results reveal that being outcome-focused is associated with positive evaluations of gamification and quantified-self design classes. Users with higher proving-orientation perceived gamification and social networking design classes as more important, users with lower goal avoidance-orientation perceived social networking design as more important, whereas users with higher mastery-orientation perceived quantified-self design more important. Users with difficult goals were less likely to perceive gamification and social networking design important, whereas for users with high goal specificity quantified-self features were important. The findings provide insights for the automatic adaptation of motivational designs to users' goals. However, more research is naturally needed to further investigate generalizability of the results.

Context Since its inception around 2010, gamification has become one of the top technology and software trends. However, gamification has also been regarded as one of the most challenging areas of software engineering. Beyond traditional software design requirements, designing gamification requires the command of disciplines such as (motivational/behavioral) psychology, game design, and narratology, making the development of gamified software a challenge for traditional software developers. Gamification software inhabits a finely tuned niche of software engineering that seeks for both high functionality and engagement; beyond technical flawlessness, gamification has to motivate and affect users. Consequently, it has also been projected that most gamified software is doomed to fail. Objective This paper seeks to advance the understanding of designing gamification and to provide a comprehensive method for developing gamified software. Method We approach the research problem via a design science research approach; firstly, by synthesizing the current body of literature on gamification design methods and by interviewing 25 gamification experts, producing a comprehensive list of design principles for developing gamified software. Secondly, and more importantly, we develop a detailed method for engineering of gamified software based on the gathered knowledge and design principles. Finally, we conduct an evaluation of the artifacts via interviews of ten gamification experts and implementation of the engineering method in a gamification project. Results As results of the study, we present the method and key design principles for engineering gamified software. Based on the empirical and expert evaluation, the developed method was deemed as comprehensive, implementable, complete, and useful. We deliver a comprehensive overview of gamification guidelines and shed novel insights into the nature of gamification development and design discourse. Conclusion This paper takes first steps towards a comprehensive method for gamified software engineering.

This chapter outlines a specific framework for the creation of critical playable cities. This framework combines three different concepts: DIY urbanism, critical design and urban gamification which are seen as complementary to each other. Cities are complex systems. Various actors often explicitly or implicitly harmonize or collide to shape the landscape of a city and its future. In the past decades, there has been an increased interest in activating citizens as vital actors in shaping urban life. This has taken place through various practical works and research around the paradigms of Playable Cities, DIY Urbanism and Gamification amongst other paradigms. Urban gamification—that is, using play and playfulness to alter our perception of and interactions with city spaces—is specifically emerging as one of the main strategies to activate citizens. Urban gamification alone, however, risks to be disconnected from the urban fabric and its communities. In this chapter we argue that combining it with the grassroot approach of DIY urbanism and the thought-provoking techniques of critical design creates a unique, multi-dimensional approach to designing urban experiences. This chapter, then, aims to explore how play can be used by citizens as a mean for critical reflection and practical re-appropriation of public urban spaces.