TY - JOUR
T1 - Spendency
T2 - Students' Propensity to Use System Currency
AU - Snow, Erica L.
AU - Allen, Laura K.
AU - Jackson, G. Tanner
AU - McNamara, Danielle
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 International Artificial Intelligence in Education Society.
PY - 2015/9/1
Y1 - 2015/9/1
N2 - Using students' process data from the game-based Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) iSTART-ME, the current study examines students' propensity to use system currency to unlock game-based features, (i.e., referred to here as spendency). This study examines how spendency relates to students' interaction preferences, in-system performance, and learning outcomes (i.e., self-explanation quality, comprehension). A group of 40 high school students interacted with iSTART-ME as part of an 11-session experiment (pretest, eight training sessions, posttest, and a delayed retention test). Students' spendency was negatively related to the frequency of their use of personalizable features. In addition, students' spendency was negatively related to their in-system achievements, daily learning outcomes, and performance on a transfer comprehension task, even after factoring out prior ability. The findings from this study indicate that increases in students' spendency are systematically related to their selection choices and may have a negative effect on in-system performance, immediate learning outcomes, and skill transfer outcomes. The results have particular relevance to game-based systems that incorporate currency to unlock features within games as well as to the differential tradeoffs of game features on motivation and learning.
AB - Using students' process data from the game-based Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) iSTART-ME, the current study examines students' propensity to use system currency to unlock game-based features, (i.e., referred to here as spendency). This study examines how spendency relates to students' interaction preferences, in-system performance, and learning outcomes (i.e., self-explanation quality, comprehension). A group of 40 high school students interacted with iSTART-ME as part of an 11-session experiment (pretest, eight training sessions, posttest, and a delayed retention test). Students' spendency was negatively related to the frequency of their use of personalizable features. In addition, students' spendency was negatively related to their in-system achievements, daily learning outcomes, and performance on a transfer comprehension task, even after factoring out prior ability. The findings from this study indicate that increases in students' spendency are systematically related to their selection choices and may have a negative effect on in-system performance, immediate learning outcomes, and skill transfer outcomes. The results have particular relevance to game-based systems that incorporate currency to unlock features within games as well as to the differential tradeoffs of game features on motivation and learning.
KW - Game-based features
KW - Gamification
KW - Intelligent tutoring systems
KW - Seductive distractors
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84949754295&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84949754295&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s40593-015-0044-1
DO - 10.1007/s40593-015-0044-1
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84949754295
SN - 1560-4292
VL - 25
SP - 407
EP - 427
JO - International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education
JF - International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education
IS - 3
ER -