Gamification is still one of the great hypes of recent years. Unfortunately, studies that really show positive effects are rare, especially in the area of teaching. The authors propose a new framework for gamification that takes more dimensions into account instead of focusing only on purely motivational aspects. They propose behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement as key factors for success. Those factors should be related to gamification strategies, learning outcomes, and user- and task-related factors. To prove their ideas, they ran a user study with two interactive systems: one nongamified, one gamified (points, badges, and leader boards). The experimental design was based on two factors: the two systems (gamified, nongamified) as one factor and six basic tasks as the other factor. Without going into the details of the authors’ analysis, they show that “the study confirmed the relationship within the three dimensions of engagement, between engagement and learning outcome, as well as the influence of user and task-related factors” (p. 467). Behavior, emotion, and cognition are strongly associated and influence the effects of applying gamification in teaching.

What can one learn from this for gamification experiments and applications in the teaching area? In my view, it is reasonable that those three factors have a great influence on the success of the learning output. My own (only qualitative) observations within my own projects have shown that the emotional factor is especially important, combined with a clear goal for what the learner gains from the “gamified” learning situation. Without a clear benefit for the “gaming learner” (for example, repeating the content of a lesson), gamification brings no further value for the learner; in contrast, he or she gets annoyed if this is repeated several times. One point that I missed in the paper is that learning is not a one-time undertaking: a lecture lasts normally for several months. It would be interesting to see what factors are the most important ones over time and how one has to vary the different gamification strategies in order to keep learners engaged.