2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

For most students, traditional learning occurs through lectures and textbooks and assessment methods, including quizzes, assignments, and exams. This concept of traditional learning has evolved to some extent with technology, and today online, software, or mobile learning platforms and learning management systems (LMS) have become more common for students. Despite this, integrating technology into education is challenging due to many factors, including structured curriculum, academic demands, and lack of rewards. As technology continues to evolve, educational video games are gaining popularity, especially Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). These types of educational games allow students to interact with the material in new ways, which can increase their motivation, foster independence in their education, and promote a student-centered learning experience.

This research study investigates the extent that playing an emotional video game can have on the motivation of students to learn and retain information and the possible effect that changing the visuals can have on the emotions and the learning outcomes. The study design consists of five groups of participants, which include a control group that reads the end screen of the game and four groups that play different versions of the game. Students were surveyed before and after the task, and a post-study survey was sent to the participants a week after their participation to determine their motivation and learning types and how well they retained the information after one week.

Research questions addressed in this study include:
How do deep emotional engagements affect the learning outcomes of college students using educational video games?
How does the emotional and learning experience differ if the visual representation changes for college students using educational video games?

To answer these questions, we used a short educational video game specifically developed to invoke emotions to study the impact of learning. We then created four 3-D versions of the online game designed, called Freedom Bridge, for the study. Preliminary data from 20 participants show a positive retention of material learned by the group that played the game compared to the control group, who did not.

The study explored the relationship between emotional engagement through educational video games and the learning outcomes of participants. By measuring the effectiveness of emotional video games as a learning tool, this study aims to provide a more clear understanding of how video games can be used to enhance educational experiences.