The Effects of Badges and Avatar Identification on Play and Making in Educational Games
summary
Field study with N=2189 Mechanical Turk players divides participants into six badge conditions (role‑model, personal‑interest, achievement, choice, choice‑visible, none), uses a CS programming game plus a level editor, and rates created levels by 3 QA testers. Role‑model and personal‑interest badges increase avatar identification; achievement and role‑model badges raise player experience and intrinsic motivation; role‑model badges boost programming self‑efficacy. Avatar identification predicts more time spent and higher level quality (identification explains ~7.4% variance in engagement, ~1.8% time, ~3.3% quality); wishful identification correlates negatively with level quality.
AI-written summary · about