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Linköpings universitet SE–581 83 Linköping

Linköping University | Department of Computer and Information Science

Master’s thesis, 30 ECTS | Datateknik

202019 | LIU-IDA/LITH-EX-A–19/057—SE

Analysis and Optimization of the

User Interface for an Effective

Altruism Charity Application

Implementing gamification with the purpose to enhance user

engagement and increase user retention

Billy Krig

Supervisor : Anders Fröberg Examiner : Erik Berglund

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Upphovsrätt

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Abstract

Gamification has previously demonstrated successful results when it comes to increasing the user retention rate in many different sectors. Non-profit charity organisations have for the last 10 years had a retention rate that is below 50%. This thesis investigates the pos-sibility of increasing the user retention rate in the non-profit charity application The Life You Can Save(TLYCS) by implementing gamification. The gamification mechanic that was chosen for implementation was Achievements. To measure understandability the Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire was used, the four satisfaction scores of the question-naire were measured with a number between one and seven. Sven represented the highest number and one represented the lowest number. All four satisfaction scores had an aver-age number that was higher than 6. Because of the previously proved successful results of gamification and a usable implementation of achievements in the mobile application TLYCS the possibility of an increased user retention rate is assessed to be high.

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Acknowledgments

I want to thank Meepo AB for making this master thesis possible. I also want to thank my external supervisor Martin for all the support, my examiner Erik for the feedback and guid-ance, my parents for helping me move to Stockholm for this thesis and to all the people that participated in the user tests.

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Contents

Abstract iii

Acknowledgments iv

Contents v

List of Figures vii

List of Tables ix 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Motivation . . . 1 1.2 Aim . . . 2 1.3 Research questions . . . 2 1.4 Delimitations . . . 2 2 Theory 3 2.1 Company background . . . 3 2.2 Technical platform . . . 3 2.3 Gamification . . . 5

2.4 The MDE framework . . . 7

2.5 Effective altruism . . . 9

2.6 Method for designing gamification . . . 10

2.7 Different types of players . . . 16

2.8 The Playful experience framework . . . 17

2.9 The Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire . . . 19

3 Method 22 3.1 Project preparation . . . 22 3.2 Analysis . . . 22 3.3 Ideation . . . 23 3.4 Design . . . 23 3.5 Implementation . . . 24 3.6 Evaluation . . . 24 4 Results 25 4.1 Project preparation . . . 25 4.2 Analysis . . . 25 4.3 Ideation . . . 26 4.4 Design . . . 29 4.5 Implementation . . . 30 4.6 Evaluation . . . 39

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5 Discussion 42

5.1 Results . . . 42

5.2 Monitoring . . . 43

5.3 Method . . . 44

5.4 The work in a wider context . . . 44

6 Conclusion 46 6.1 Future work . . . 47

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List of Figures

2.1 Principles of gamification with The MDE framework . . . 9

2.2 Activities related to the preparation phase . . . 13

2.3 Activities related to the analysis . . . 14

2.4 Activities related to the design . . . 15

2.5 Activities related to the implementation . . . 15

2.6 Bartle’s model for player types . . . 17

2.7 PLEX scenario template . . . 18

4.1 The distribution of PLEX cards in the brainstorming session . . . 26

4.2 The distribution of PLEX cards in the scenario session . . . 26

4.3 Question 1 . . . 28 4.4 Question 2 . . . 28 4.5 Question 3 . . . 28 4.6 Question 4 . . . 28 4.7 Question 5 . . . 28 4.8 Question 6 . . . 28 4.9 Question 7 . . . 28 4.10 Question 8 . . . 28

4.11 Select charity organisation . . . 31

4.12 Information about the Against Malaria Foundation . . . 32

4.13 Select how many bednets you want to donate to the Against Malaria Foundation . 33 4.14 Complete the donation with your chosen payment alternative . . . 34

4.15 The thank you page including the achievement First-timer . . . 35

4.16 The achievement page . . . 36

4.17 The specific achievement page for the First-timer achievement . . . 37

4.18 The specific achievement page for the Five bednets! achievement . . . 38

4.19 Statement 1 . . . 40 4.20 Statement 2 . . . 40 4.21 Statement 3 . . . 40 4.22 Statement 4 . . . 40 4.23 Statement 5 . . . 40 4.24 Statement 6 . . . 40 4.25 Statement 7 . . . 40 4.26 Statement 8 . . . 40 4.27 Statement 9 . . . 40 4.28 Statement 10 . . . 41 4.29 Statement 11 . . . 41 4.30 Statement 12 . . . 41 4.31 Statement 13 . . . 41 4.32 Statement 14 . . . 41

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List of Tables

2.1 The design principles mapped into the method phase . . . 12

2.2 The design principles mapped into the method phase . . . 18

2.3 The five different characteristics . . . 19

2.4 PSSUQ questions . . . 20

2.5 The five different characteristics . . . 21

2.6 Correlation between questions and sub-sclaes . . . 21

4.1 The initial identified goals . . . 25

4.2 Questions in the survey . . . 27

4.3 Colour coding . . . 27

4.4 Mean and standard deviation of the survey . . . 28

4.5 The gamification ideas that were chosen to prototype . . . 29

4.6 Implemented achievements . . . 30

4.7 PSSUQ questions . . . 39

4.8 Correlation between questions and sub-sclaes . . . 39

4.9 Colour coding . . . 40

4.10 Correlation between questions and sub-sclaes . . . 41

6.1 Potential implementation ideas . . . 46

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1

Introduction

Gamification has recently become a trending topic within application development in the software industry. The concept originates from the implementation of game-like elements in non-game contexts with the purpose to enhance user participation and increase user re-tention. The normal retention rate in the mobile game industry just reaches 14.5 % and the paying customers retention rate can be as low as 5 % [26].

Gamification is considered to be a dynamic concept that is applicable in many different sec-tors, Kasurinen and Knutas[26] are claiming that the most prominent theme in gamification research right now concerns education. A popular part of online education is massive open online courses (MOOCs). According to Krause et al.[28] the user retention in MOOCs have increased significantly after the implementation of gamified software.

Gamification has beyond education purposes been used in a health game named Health Month, in a task managing service called EpicWin, in an application called Recyclebank that focuses on sustainability and in the popular user-oriented online service StackOverflow [11]. Charity applications could be the next sector for gamification to be established in.

1.1

Motivation

The implementation of gamification provides a great possibility to both increase user reten-tion and enhance user participareten-tion, the effects of gamificareten-tion has previously been proved to generate astounding results especially in online education. Even if gamification in the past has not primarily been used in charity applications it is a great opportunity to support an important cause. Currently there is a disquieting low retention rate of donors to non profit organisations, according to 2018 Fundraising Effectiveness Survey Report [4] the majority of the donors to non-profit organisations do not return. This has consistently been a problem for the last ten years where the average percentage has been below 50%.

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1.2. Aim

1.2

Aim

Meepo is developing a cross-platform mobile application together with the non-profit organ-isation The Life You Can Save. The goal is to implement a gamification element that increases the user engagement and makes it more fun to donate money to charities that have proven effective results(Effective Altruism).

1.3

Research questions

This thesis intends to investigate possible gamification elements that are suitable for increas-ing the user retention rate in the non-profit charity application The Life You Can Save. The research questions that will be answered are stated below.

1. Which gamification elements are the alternatives to implement in the mobile applica-tion TLYCS? Which of these alternatives is both appreciated by potential users and suit-able for implementation in this particular thesis?

2. How does a specific type of gamification element affect the possibility of achieving a higher user retention rate in the non-profit charity application The Life You Can Save?

1.4

Delimitations

This report will not at all focus on attracting new users to the application. It will neither directly focus on user retention, it will rather focus on usability of the implementation that potentially increases the possibility for a higher user retention rate. A/B-tests will not be conducted for several reasons, one of the reasons is that the application has not been released yet.

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2

Theory

2.1

Company background

Meepo AB is the name of the company that originally proposed this master thesis, it is a small Swedish organisation located in central parts of Stockholm. The company has a flat organi-sation structure and has had a continuously growth ever since the company was founded in 2011. The company encourages both creativity and new ideas and is currently operating in the borderline between application development and IT-management consulting. In corpo-ration with the non-profit organisation The Life You Can Save (TLYCS) Meepo is developing an application that will make it more fun to donate money to effective charity organisations. TLYCS was founded by Peter Singer who originally expressed the ideas in his book "The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty". The book became widely known and was de-scribed as "A persuasive and inspiring work that will change the way you think about philanthropy." by no others than Bill and Melinda Gates.

The former president of the apparel company "Men’s Wearhouse" became Executive Direc-tor for TLYCS in 2013. His name is Charlie Bresler and had a long-standing desire to work directly on social and economical issues. His role in TLYCS involves counteracting extreme poverty and its atrocious consequences on over 700 million people around the world. [39]

2.2

Technical platform

The TLYCS application is on the cutting edge of modern technology since it is being de-veloped in Google’s new cross-platform framework Flutter and programmed in the object-oriented programming language Dart.

2.2.1

Flutter

There was previously an obvious problem with cross-platform mobile development. Appli-cations that were developed for different operating systems either had to be built multiple times or accept drastically decreases in native speed and accuracy to achieve the desired portability. Flutter is a framework that solves this problem by providing the best solution for

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2.2. Technical platform

both worlds. To describes the main characteristics of Flutter it is being separated into four different dimensions. [19]

1. Developers are getting full control of the whole development process and do not need to worry about limitations regarding underlying frameworks. Every pixel can be con-trolled on the screen, with widgets you can create pixel-perfect experiences for both android and IOS.

2. It is very common that modern browsers try to use the same refresh rate as your device. If the refresh rate of your device is 60 Hz it means that the screen will try to refresh 60 times per second. If someone scrolls on the screen the browser will create 60 frames per second to match the refresh rate. Sometimes that can feel buggy when the site or application can not keep up with that refresh rate. Flutter is designed to prevent these kind of problems.

3. Due to stateful hot reload the development cycle has become significantly more produc-tive. This is because developers are given the opportunity to iterate on their applica-tions in real time without restarting it.

4. There is a possibility for developers to contribute to Flutter since it is an open source project. This means that Flutter continuously can be improved by people all over the world.

in conclusion, Flutter is a great framework to use when developing applications with high performance standards for both IOS and android.

2.2.2

Dart

Dart is an object-oriented programming language that is developed by Google. The language is described as productive, fast, portable, approachable and reactive. [9] The syntax of dart is considered to be both clear and concise and reminds of c++, c# or Java syntax. Dart also consists of libraries that contains thousands of packages. Applications that are developed in Dart can run natively on both Android and IOS since Dart compiles to both ARM and x86 code.

2.2.3

BloC architecture

BLoC is an acronym for Business Logic Component and is an architecture design pattern. It was introduced at Google’s I/O conference 2018. The pattern’s purpose is to store the business logic in pure Dart code so it can be used by other platforms. To achieve this structure there are several goals that have to be fulfilled. The communication flow between the layers is important to maintain since the framework does not allow steps to be skipped. The view layer should not contain any business logic, it should only be used to display data and respond to user interactions. It is not allowed to include any platform-specific dependencies in the BloC since it only should contain pure dart business logic. The input to the BLoC should be a Sink and the output should be a stream. [5]

2.2.4

Firebase

Firebase can be described as a mobile development platform that provides a lot of function-ality for developers when building applications[17]. Since 2014 Firebase is a part of Google, the biggest reasons why Firebase decided to join Google was the opportunity to drastically

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2.3. Gamification

increase their scalability and at the same time get access to Google’s impressive cloud infras-tructure suite[18]. Late 2018 there were at least 1.5 million applications every month that were using Firebase’s services. [40]

Cloud Functions

Cloud functions are managed by Google’s servers, functions can be handled in two different ways. Either the functions are immediately run with an HTTP request or the functions first runs when it has been triggered [6]. The cloud functions in TLYCS are written in TypeScript and is at deploytime converted to JaveScript.

2.3

Gamification

Simultaneously as gamification has received a lot of attention from the software industry during the last few years it has also acknowledged recognition in the academic world. Gam-ification has contributed to the successful mobile services like Foursquare and Nike+ [25]. Ac-cording to Huotari and Hamari [25] gamification is defined as "a process of enhancing a service with affordances for gameful experiences in order to support user’s overall value creation.". The fun-damentals in that definition concerns the representation of gamification as experiences rather than methods. Deterding et al. [13] propose that gamification should be defined as using game design elements in a non-game context and Robson et al. are claiming that "gamifi-cation is the appli"gamifi-cation of lessons from the gaming domain to change behaviours in non-game sit-uations."[38]. There are several different definitions of gamification available, the common denominator is that gamification is a relatively wide concept that concerns user experiences from gamified design.

2.3.1

Successful gamification

Since the deployment of gamification recently has become more and more common, some of the largest brands in the world including Coca-Cola, Nissan and Nike are currently working with different kinds of gamification elements. Gamification can be applied in many different sectors Just like the variety of companies that use it indicate. For example in the 2012 con-sumerization of IT enterprise conference Gabe Zichermann presented a game called Foldit which is a crowdsourcing protein folding puzzle game. In 2011 there was 46000 people who together worked on deciding the structure of a key protein that was believed to be an impor-tant part in the process of curing HIV. In just 10 days Foldit helped to solve a problem that scientists had not been able to figure out in 15 years. [7]

Dithmer et al. [14] investigated if gamification principles could affect users in a positive way when they were using the application The Heart Game. The main purpose of the application is to facilitate the telerehablitation process for heart patients. The innovation was user-driven and involved 10 different patients. For instance, a surprise mechanic was implemented and expressed in a new challenge every day, all of the patients that took part in the investiga-tion were positively tuned and motivated by this feature. Zichermann and Gunningham [41] write about the popularity of the "unboxing" videos of Apple’s famous packaging that contains an element of surprise. They also mention the application Foursquare whose entire feedback system is based on some sort of surprising element. Examples of unexpected delight are slot machines, easter eggs, geocoaching and hidden objects.

Juho Hamari[22] conducted a two year long field experiment with the purpose to investi-gate if badges would increase user activity. Hamari choose to implement badges since it has been proven to be one of the most investigated game mechanics [23]. The experiment was

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2.3. Gamification

performed on the peer-to-peer marketplace platform Sharetribe and included a total of 2989 people. Sharetribe’s market strategy is to provide a market place for local communities unlike bigger market places like eBay that focuses on a broader user base. The study was divided into two different time periods, both one calender year long. 1410 people participated in the first time period when the badges had not been implemented yet, data regarding their activity were collected and compared to the same data for the second time period. After the imple-mentation of badges 1579 people used the marketplace’s services during the second calender year(the second time period). The results showed that the people in the second time period were significantly more susceptible to actively use the service than the people that used the service before the gamification had been implemented.

Paul Denny [10] studied how the implementation of badges-based achievement systems ef-fected students’ experience in an online learning tool called PeerWise. The study contained a total of 1031 students who were divided into two different groups. The first group included 516 students that had access to the badges-based version of the tool while the second group contained 515 students that only had access to the tool version without any badges. The par-ticipation rate was pretty high, 97% of the 1031 student answered at least one question in the learning tool. In the first group 80 % of the students managed to earn more than half of the 22 available badges. The average number of submitted answers and the average number of days active were both higher in the badges group compared to the non-badges group. More than 60 % of the students in the badges group argued that the badges increased their enjoyment, just 12.5 % of the students argued that it did not increase their enjoyment. 4 % of the students in the badges group would prefer if there were not any badges at all present in PeerWise while 60 % of the students disagreed on that.

2.3.2

Problems with gamification

A very important aspect to consider when implementing gamification is that every game is not fun, many games are not even worth playing. Despite success stories like Jay-Z’s world wide treasure hunt Decode and the cloud based customer support platform Freshdesk there is no guarantee that gamification always helps to achieve the planned purpose. Gamification is not easy, many otherwise successful companies have tried to implement gamification but have not succeeded to increase their engagement levels or achieve their performance goals. A concrete example of a bad gamification mechanic setup was Google’s badges system. The basic idea was to reward users with badges for reading the news, it failed since users did not want others to know what kind of news the searched for. Just because gamification is useful in some contexts for some companies it does not mean that it is suitable for every company in all contexts. [37]

The Mariott Hotel chain did an unsuccessful attempt of implementing gamification when they launched the Facebook game My Mariot hotels 2011. The purpose of the game was to at-tract new employees to the company with a simulation environment that reflected actual du-ties in the hotel. When virtual customers demonstrated satisfaction the player was rewarded with points. But the points were not connected to any meaningful purpose, the implementa-tion of game mechanics were unstructured and did not produce any addiimplementa-tional values to the players. The original motivation for exercising the game could be questioned, the points did not really lead to anything. To make the rewards system more attractive the points should be meaningful. Maybe the players would have been more inclined to apply for a job at Mariot hotel if they knew that they were guaranteed a real job interview at a Martiot Hotel if they reached a predetermined number of points in the virtual game environment. The game did

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2.4. The MDE framework

not either attract all kind of player types which is a problem since it excludes a lot of players from the very beginning. [37]

2.3.3

Retention

Use gamification to receive volunteer retention in a non-profit organisation

One of the most important aspects of managing a non-profit organisation has recently become volunteer retention since the sector has become more competitive [16]. To recruit a new vol-unteer to a non-profit organisation costs at least five times more than keeping an existing one. That is why it is important to assure the volunteers’ long-term loyalty to the organisation[33]. If the non-profit organisation manage to keep existing volunteers they would probably lower their operating costs and increase their sustainability.

The focus of the four loyalty and engagement models(tangible goods, cash incentives, loy-alty systems and virtual rewards) have changed over time. Previously they have been more payment-to-products and services cycles oriented, but have lately been progressed to repre-sent a more modern approach consisting of virtual status badges . This development impli-cate that gamification has a strong potential to increase the customer engagement and cus-tomer retention in non-profit organisations. [21]

Engagement

According to Muntean[35] rising the user engagement is the most important goal for gamifi-cation. This can be done by mixing intrinsic motivation like altruism with extrinsic motiva-tions like points or awards. In order to maintain users’ attention and interest in an application it has to be both engaging and contribute to positive emotions.

2.4

The MDE framework

The MDE framework includes three different gamification principles: mechanics, dynamics and emotions. The principles are based on the literature that handles game design [24]. To get a better understanding of the significance and the meaning of each principle they will be further described below.

2.4.1

Mechanics

Mechanics are described as the decisions designers make to specify goals, settings and the context of the situation that should be gamified. The mechanics are considered to be static and does not change over time, the same environment always applies. To illustrate the con-cept of mechanics with a real world example we can analyse the exorbitantly popular strategy board game chess. Before you start to experience chess there are some prerequisites that are constant. For example there are a limited set of pieces, how different pieces are allowed to move, how many pattern squares the board should contain and how a winner is designated. When talking about organisational control theory, mechanics that corresponds to organisa-tional systems and technologies can be used by managers to evaluate the situation to be able to achieve the required results. [38]

Mechanics can be expressed in three different types, the utilisation of these types are not only extremely important for games but also for the gamified experience. The different types are Setup mechanics, rule mechanics and progression mechanics. To obtain a more comprehensive perspective of the representation of each mechanic type they will be meticulous described below.

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2.4. The MDE framework

1. Setup mechanics reflect the creational process that includes shaping the environment in relation to the targeted experience. To further explain the purpose of setup mechanics it is appropriate to include an example. It is the role of this mechanic type to decide which opponent a player should be facing. Is it opponent known or unknown? Is it internal or external? Is it a single opponent or a group of opponents? These type of decisions will affect the gamified experience. It is a design aspect to make decisions regarding the player structure which will influence the user experience, what type of player/players is/are the experience designed for?

2. Rule mechanics process the goals in relation to the gamified experience and do not only prescribe the permissible actions but it also prescribes the constraints. For exam-ple, time could be restricted in order to create pressure on the player. There are different types of rule mechanics as well, some rule mechanics can for example be highly deter-ministic, that means if the user contentiously make identical inputs the mechanic will produce invariable results. Another type of rule mechanics would instead be consid-ered non-deterministic, this type primarily applies in situations when interactions with other players are possible and when random generated elements are involved. It is also possible for rule mechanics to be topological, the consequences for a player is depen-dant on the interaction. If rule mechanics are time- or objective-based depends on the interaction, if the user have to adapt to a time frame then it is time based. If a user has to meet specific circumstances to complete a level the rule mechanic is objective-based. 3. Progression mechanics are supposed to impact the experience in real time. These types of mechanics are dictating the reinforcements that are present in the experience. If users are rewarded it is more likely for them to repeat their behaviour in the future. Achievement rewards as virtual point systems are often used to illustrate the user’s progress, it could include scores, levels or progress bars. Badges, trophies and leader-boards are achievement rewards with social significance and is considered to be power-ful progress mechanics in communities where social standings are important. Regard-less of the choice of progress mechanics it is crucial that the achievement rewards are desirable, otherwise the experience will lose its importance. Extrinsic rewards as prizes and money can either be zero- or positive-sum. Zero-sum indicate that some of the players lose and some of them win. Positive-sum on the other hand indicate that more players win than lose, the total rewards are above zero. The balance of the intended distribution of extrinsic rewards are important as well as the number of total rewards. If users are getting rewarded too much the rewards will potentially not be appreciated and lose its original purpose, they might even be annoying.

Gamification mechanics are essential for the gamified experience. It is the mechanics that decide which the key parties are, the interactions between them, what the winning conditions are and lastly the time and place for the experience. The interdependent relationship between mechanics, dynamics and emotions will together be used to achieve the desired goal for the company. Mechanics alone are not enough to create an experience that will be useful for the intended purpose, it just creates the structure where the gamified experience is included.

2.4.2

Dynamics

Gamification dynamics discloses the behaviour of players when they participate in the expe-rience. Dynamics describe how players follow the mechanics chosen by designers and does not include how the mechanics are actually set. If both the mechanic and dynamic perspec-tives are derived from the card game Poker it is clear how they differ. The mechanics of Poker

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2.5. Effective altruism

include shuffling, trick-taking and betting while the dynamics is more like bluffing, cheating, conspiring and bragging. Mechanics like team-based player structures can in gamification lead to corporation dynamics while individual structures can induce more competitive dy-namics. Dynamics of gamification can be hard to predict, which can lead to unexpected out-comes of both positive and negative nature. The challenge for the designers is to anticipate the dynamics that are emerged from the mechanics of the experience.

2.4.3

Emotions

Gamification emotions are evoked by individuals that take part in gamified experiences. Emotions are the results from how users follow mechanics and accordingly generating dy-namics. With the same principle as in games the gamified experience should be both appeal-ing and fun not only on a pragmatic level but also on an emotional level. Assumappeal-ing that the application usage is purely based on player enjoyment it is considered the most important goal for player engagement in gamification. Enjoyments can be expressed in positive emo-tions like excitement, amusement, amazement, surprise, wonder and personal triumph. To have fun is an important aspect in gamified environments, it is also connected with differ-ent types of emotions. It doesn’t always have to be positive emotions but also emotions like disappointment or sadness.

Figure 2.1 illustrates the interdependent relationship between mechanics, dynamics and emo-tions. Depending on how these principles are being used there are possibilities to extend the player’s experience. Different experiences can be generated when making small changes in one of the principles that effect the other two. The MDE framework facilitates the perception of gamified experience dependent on players and designers. The focus is different depending on who you are. For example, different types of challenges and the associated dynamics that comes with it are more important for the players than the rules that the designer has set to make it possible. To understand the role of these three different principles and their internal relationship are the key for creating successful gamified experiences.[38]

Figure 2.1: Principles of gamification with The MDE framework

2.5

Effective altruism

The intended demographics that would be appealed of the TLYCS application is primarily Ef-fective Altruists. William MacAskill began to develop the concept of efEf-fective altruism during his time as a graduate student at Oxford University. When MacAskill was donating money to charities he wanted to make sure that the donations had as large impact as possible. When he was investigating the cost-effectiveness in charities that were specified in fighting poverty in the development world he found some notable results. The most effective charities were

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2.6. Method for designing gamification

hundred times more effective at improving lives than some other "good" charities. Together with Toby Ord, a postdoctoral researcher at Oxford, MacAskill co-funded the cost-effective organisation "Giving What You Can" that encourages people to donate 10% of their income to effective charity organisations. [32]

To illustrate how existing resources could be distributed to effectively help people with HIV or aids we can look at a real world example. Dr. Toby shows how effective a 1000 dollar do-nation can be across different interventions. The results show a pretty significant difference, if you compare surgical treatment with providing educational programs for high risk groups the education program provides 1400 times higher impact in terms of cost efficiency. [36]

2.6

Method for designing gamification

Business analysts predicted that more than half of all organisations would have some sort of gamification element implemented in their software systems by 2015. Even if that would be true the majority of these implementations would probably fail due to poor understanding of gamification design. The core reason for that is that many companies do not spare enough resources for the implementation and design. Often they just introduce the most superficial parts of gamification that consists of simple game mechanics like displaying a scoreboards containing a list of the people that have collected the most points. The complexity regard-ing gamification design primarily relates to the multifaceted concept of games, to make the gamification useful and not only make it fun, to limit the amount of design space in a serious context and finally to affect changes in people’s behaviour.

Morschheuser et al. [34] managed to extract 17 different gamification methods from 41 rele-vant articles and 25 interviews with gamification experts from 17 countries. the articles were retrieved from the following databases: ProQuest, ACM Digital Library, AIS Electronic Li-brary, IEEE Xplore Digital Library. The 17 methods were pointing to seven main phases of engineering gamified software. Those phases are:

1. Project preparation: Includes all the relevant activities that need to be performed be-fore the the project can start.

2. Analysis: Is used to identify the relevant information according to the users, processes and the project itself.

3. Ideation: Generating ideas for gamification design.

4. Design: Where the gamification elements are design and made into prototypes. 5. Implementation: Deploying the software with the chosen gamification element. 6. Evaluation: Evaluate the software and the results of testing the software. 7. Monitoring: Analyse the the software performance after the release.

There are a lot of elements that make game engineering a complex process, for example game engineering includes knowledge across different professions such as psychology, design and programming. According to Morschheuser et al.[34] the 13 most important principles to de-sign gamification are:

1. Understand what the users wants and what the users needs. Instead of focusing on the business goals the focus should revolve around the user experience. It is an important

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2.6. Method for designing gamification

part of the process to involve actual users in the ideation and design phase, that can de-termine if the design is correctly addressed. The purpose is to invoke the motivational experiences.

2. The concrete goals with the gamified implementation should be meticulously defined. Clear project objectives is essential for both success evaluation and for guiding the whole software project.

3. It is recommended to test gamification ideas frequently to see if they are relevant for the users and worth continuing investment.

4. Since gamification is considered a continuous activity it is recommended to apply iter-ative development to achieve long-term success.

5. It is a necessity to posses knowledge in gamification design and human motivation. It is important to have an objective perspective and avoid falling in the pitfall of using simple gamification elements such as scoreboards.

6. To know whether gamification is the best option for the situation since it does not really have any limitations. Only the creativity limits the result of the implementation of a gamified element.

7. Projects that contains gamified software tends to fail due to the fact that key stake-holders are not sufficiently involved in the process. This can depend on the lack of understanding of gamification potential. An important part would be to convince the key stakeholders about the potential benefits with the solution.

8. Gamification should focus on the user needs rather than businesses needs. It is very common that those needs differ, since the motivational outcome of gamification de-pends on what the actual users needs, user needs should be prioritised.

9. A decision regarding the metrics use should be taken in the beginning of the process. Clear metrics are important for the evaluation of the gamification effect, to see how results correlate to the intended goals. The eventual changes in game mechanics would also be based on that evaluation which makes the accuracy really important.

10. Cheating is a potential way of reducing the effects of gamification. It can contribute to discouraging users to use the application. Cheating does not always have to be a bad thing since it can help to understand user behaviour and in the long term change and optimise the gamification accordingly.

11. To use continuous evaluations of the gamified software ensures that the design is still relevant and optimised. Prerequisites can change, like an unexpected fast growth of the user base or that the user needs are changed. The application can reach new segments of the market that might mean that entire new user group begin to utilise the software. 12. It is important to consider the legal and ethical aspects in the gamified software design since it is a potential failure risk. For example it is very advantageously to avoid in-fringements to the intellectual rights of others. This is extra important to consider when gamification is applied in enterprise software.

13. Involve the intended users as early as possible in the design phase. It can be done with regular user tests that ensures that the gamified software is designed to meet the user needs.

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2.6. Method for designing gamification

The derived design principles were then mapped into the method phases according to Table 2.1 below.

Table 2.1: The design principles mapped into the method phase Method phase Design principle

Project preparation 2,6,7,9 Analysis 1 Ideation 8,13 Design 3, 4, 5 ,12 ,13 Implementation of design 4, 11, 13 Evaluation 9 Monitoring 9,10,11

To receive a more detailed view of each method phase, they will now be further explained and illustrated in the following sections.

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2.6. Method for designing gamification

2.6.1

Project preparation

This is the first step in the creation of a project plan. Figure 2.2 illustrates which activities that are included in this phase. The main purpose is to clarify the goals of the gamification project in accordance with design principle two(DP2). To derive goals in the beginning of the project makes it easier to measure if the project successfully has been completed in the end, this correlates to what is communicated in the ninth design principle(DP9). Many companies that use gamification have a rough idea of what they want to do, if the goals are not clearly defined it will be hard to find an appropriate measurement method. Initially the goals should focus on user needs and not business objectives. In this phase it should be possible to decide if implementing gamification into the software will solve the problem and help to achieve the desired goals as mentioned in design principle six(DP6). To improve the communication among the stakeholders it is also recommended to create vision statements to communicate the software gamification goals to the stakeholders. To rank and justify the chosen goals will help to get an objective overview of what is important. The expected outcome from this phase is to identify the requirements and have an initial idea of what should be done, this can differ significantly between different gamification projects.

Figure 2.2: Activities related to the preparation phase

2.6.2

Analysis

According to the first design principle(DP1) it is important to understand both the target group and the conceptual characteristics for the design of the gamified software. This phase will include the definition of the success metrics since it provides ways to analyse the per-formance of the gamified software. The metrics can for example be used to measure player activity or the extent of behavioural change.

The idea with user analysis is to focus on what defines and characterise the intended user groups and how to obtain and evaluate information regarding potential new users for the gamified system. To do this several methods are suggested including user interviews, obser-vations, measurements of user behaviour and surveys. It is also important to fully

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under-2.6. Method for designing gamification

stand the context since it is there the gamification will be applied. To understand the context is often referred to as a very important aspect of the analysis since it constitutes the key re-quirements to successfully design gamified software. To understand business processes and technological constraints is also important in order to fully understand the context. Figure 2.3 illustrates activities related to the analysis phase.

Figure 2.3: Activities related to the analysis

2.6.3

Ideation

When the characteristics of both the context and the users have been analysed it is time to develop the gamification design. Design principle eight(DP8) includes the selection of game elements based on the previously identified user needs. It is a little bit dangerous to use predefined methods regarding gamification design since it might harm the creative process. A commonly known method that can be considered in this situation is to use already existing game features as building blocks. The building blocks can for example be rewards, points and leaderboards. The building blocks can be combined to motivate a goal-oriented behaviour. Instead of just focusing on existing building block and eventually harm the creative thinking it is recommended to use brainstorming processes. The brainstorming process should gener-ate a lot of possible implementation ideas. To guide the ideation it is recommended to use a framework like the User-Center Design Framework, the Octalysis Framework or the Playful Experience framework (PLEX).

2.6.4

Design

After all the idea generation, the ideas can be implemented in concrete gamification design. This phase is strongly related to ideation and focuses on the effectiveness of a specific idea. The third design principle(DP3) suggests rapid development of prototypes, for example pa-per prototypes. The fourth design principle(DP4) clarifies that an iterative process would be advantageously since it generates frequent test opportunities. This means that the proto-type can be continuously improved until it is efficient enough to reach the previously defined goals according to the thirteenth design principle(DP13).

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2.6. Method for designing gamification

According to the twelfth design principle(DP12) the legal and the ethical aspects should be considered as well as the different activities in this phase, that is communicated by the fifth design principle(DP5).

Figure 2.4: Activities related to the design

2.6.5

Implementation

The main purpose of this phase is to develop a pilot that can be used for evaluating the desired gamified software. It is even in this phase preferred to use an iterative approach(DP 4), technical issues can then fast be identified and fixed. After the development cycles and the playtesting it is suggested to evaluate the gamification and modify it to become more successful and effective according to the eleventh design principle(DP11). The activities in this phase are displayed in Figure 2.5

Figure 2.5: Activities related to the implementation

2.6.6

Evaluation

The purpose of this phase is to evaluate if the software that has been developed meets the original requirements and goals that were defined in the project preparation phase. It is in this phase the set metrics for gamification evaluation should be used in accordance with design principle nine(DP9). Gamification can typically be evaluated using A/B-testing and can contain both quantitative and qualitative results.

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2.7. Different types of players

2.6.7

Monitoring

Gamification is by many experts considered to be a never ending iterative process. There are always things to improve and evaluate in accordance with the eleventh design princi-ple(DP11). When data is continuously collected it can be used to check if the desired be-haviour is achieved as stated in the ninth design principle(DP9).

The above described method is comprehensive, complete and introduces several crucial as-pects of formalised software engineering that have not previously been considered. For ex-ample, literature in the past[12] has had a different approach to how the ideation should be performed. In practice that phase is often related to a more brainstorming-based activity rather than a more formal approach. This has resulted in a separation between the design and ideation phase.

2.7

Different types of players

A possible way of categorise player types is to use Bartle’s model. Even if the model in the past has received some critic, it is still one of the most prominent models for evaluating player typologies. [15] The model is derived from a discussion regarding what people want to get out of Multi User Dungeons (MUD). A MUD was the first chance for people to interact with a virtual environment in a text based real time virtual world. The discussion culminated in four different categories that described the players. Those categories were:

1. Achievers: Includes persons that play the game to achieve the predefined goals and explore the world to progress through the built-in ranking system. They also value their formal status.

2. Socialisers: Includes interacting with other players. The cause of the game is to interact with others in the virtual world.

3. Explorers: Instead of interacting with other players this category focuses on interac-tions between the player and the world.

4. Killers: Usually feels that the most exiting part of the game is the competition with other players. More explicit the goal is to dominate, kill or make the life hard for others in the virtual environment.

The model can be visualised in a graph that illustrates how the categories are related to each other. The graph also indicates how the different categories refer to the change in the empha-sis and to the change in acting depending on where they are located[3]. The visual represen-tation of the categories are displayed in Figure 2.6

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2.8. The Playful experience framework

Figure 2.6: Bartle’s model for player types

The idea is that the different axis should represent the different players’ interest in a MUD. If we first focus on the x-axis it goes from emphasising on players(to the left) to emphasising on the environment/the world(to the right). If we then proceed to the y-axis it is supposed to represent the change in acting, the bottom represent the acting WITH while the top of the axis represents the acting ON. For example, socialisers interact with players while killers interact on players. The same thing goes for achievers that act ON the world while explorers act/interact WITH the world.

2.8

The Playful experience framework

The PLEX framework is an expanded version of the pleasure framework that originally was published by Costello and Edmonds[8]. The extended version has been developed by Korho-nen et al.[27]. Unlike the original 13 pleasure categories the framework now consists of 22 playful experience categories [30]. The reason for why the focus was shifted from the plea-sure approach to the new experience oriented approach was because all experiences related to such activities could not always be considered pleasurable in the context of play [31]. A list of the framework’s categories are presented in table 2.2

PLEX is usually used as a basis for design-related activities like concept development. The experiences in Table 2.2 can be translated in to design cards in order to provide inspiration for such activities. The cards are an elemental way of communicating the different categories that are displayed in the PLEX cards. There are two main purposes of the PLEX framework. The first one is to handle it as a conceptual tool to help understanding aspects of user expe-rience(UX), for example the playful aspects. The second purpose of the framework is to use it as a practical tool for designing playful experiences through established methods within user-centered design(UCD). Playful experiences are mostly non-goal-oriented and are mainly concentrated around the pleasurable aspects of a product.

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2.8. The Playful experience framework

Table 2.2: The design principles mapped into the method phase

Experience Description

Captivation Forgetting about the surroundings

Challenge Test your abilities when the task to perform is demanding Competition A contest approach to either yourself or an opponent

Completion Feeling closure when finishing an major task Control Dominating, commanding, regulating Cruelty When contributing to physical or mental damage Discovery Find something that is new and unexplored

Eroticism A sexually arousing experience

Exploration Investigate a situation

Expression To be creative when expressing things

Fantasy Experience that isn’t real

Fellowship Friendship, communality or intimacy Humor Fun, joy, amusement, jokes, gags Nurture Taking care of yourself and others

Relaxation Take it easy and not work either bodily or mentally Sensation To be excited when simulating senses Simulation Is an imitation of the everyday life Submission To be a part of something like a larger structure Subversion For example to break social norms

Suffering Is something that is experience during anger or frustration Sympathy To share feelings that are emotional

Thrill Excitment from taking risks

There are two different types of techniques that can be used within the PLEX framework. The first technique focuses on quality and is called the PLEX Scenario. The approach for this tech-nique works like this: 3 cards are randomly drawn from a deck of cards. The intention with these three cards are to create an initial idea. One persons chooses a card and expresses an ac-tion that triggers a scenario. An other person chooses a second card and extends the scenario that were evoked from the first card. The last card should then close the story. The process of this technique is displayed in Figure 2.7 and is preferable when generating elaborate ideas.[2]

Figure 2.7: PLEX scenario template

When focusing on quantity rather than quality an appropriate idea generation approach is the PLEX brainstorming technique. The prerequisites needed for this method is two players and a deck of PLEX cards. The first player draws a random seed card from the deck. Beyond that, each player randomly draws three more cards. The first player starts to explore an idea based on the seed card. When the first player is done by explaining his idea it is time for the

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2.9. The Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire

second player to use one of the cards from his deck to elaborate or change the idea. When the second player is done it is time for the first player to repeat the same procedure as the second player just did. This goes on until both players’ cards are used. [30]

2.9

The Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire

The Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire(PSSUQ) was first developed at the multina-tional IT company IBM in an internal project called SUMS(System Usability MetricS). The questionnaire was developed as a research instrument intended to evaluate scenario-based usability. The five main characteristics that should be included in the PSSUQ are described in the paper Assessing the Reliability, Validity and Adaptability of PSSUQ [20] and illustrated in Table 2.3

Table 2.3: The five different characteristics

Characteristic number Characteristic

1 Quickly completion of work

2 Easily learn the system

3 High quality documentation and online information

4 Satisfying functionality

5 Rapid acquisition

Table 2.4 illustrates the 19 questions that constitutes the PSSUQ, these questions should reflect the five characteristics from Table 2.3.

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2.9. The Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire

Table 2.4: PSSUQ questions

Question number Question

1 Overall, I am satisfied with how easy it is to use this system.

2 It was simple to use this system.

3 I could effectively complete the tasks and scenarios using this system. 4 I was able to complete the tasks and scenarios quickly using this system. 5 I was able to efficiently complete the tasks and scenarios using this system.

6 I felt comfortable using this system

7 It was easy to learn to use this system.

8 I believe I could become productive quickly using this system. 9 The system gave error messages that clearly told me how to fix problems. 10 Whenever I made a mistake using the system, I could recover easily and quickly. 11 The information (such as on-line help, on-screen messages,

and other documentation) provided with this system was clear.

12 It was easy to find the information I needed.

13 The information provided for the system was easy to understand. 14 The information was effective in helping me complete the tasks and scenarios. 15 The organization of information on the system screens was clear.

16 The interface of this system was pleasant.

17 I liked using the interface of this system

18 This system has all the functions and capabilities I expect it to have.

19 Overall, I am satisfied with this system.

James R. Lewis[29] used factor analysis to indicate that there are three types of sub-scales in the PSSUQ. The sub-scales target different areas of usability and are named System Use-fulness(SysUse), Information Quality(InfoQual) and Interface Quality (IntQual). The overall reliability and the reliability of each the sub-scale according to Lewis are illustrated in Table 2.5.

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2.9. The Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire

Table 2.5: The five different characteristics Area Reliability

Overall 0.96

SysUse 0.96

InfoQual 0.92 IntQual 0.83

Each statement in the questionnaire is answered with a number between one and seven. One represents strongly agree while seven represents strongly disagree. The correlation between statements and sub-scales according to Lewis can be seen in Table 2.6.

Table 2.6: Correlation between questions and sub-sclaes Sub scale Questions

SysUse 1 to 8 InfoQual 9 to 15

IntQual 16 to 18

The overall usability is measured by calculating the average number of all answers to all 19 statements. The area specific usabilities are measured by the average number of the questions related to each sub-scale in Table 2.6.

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3

Method

This master thesis began with the conduction of a comprehensive literature study with the purpose of investigating if previous gamification research had indicated enhanced user en-gagement and positive impact on user retention. Since gamification is a concept that is about to be established in many different sectors and was assessed to have a great possibility to increase the engagement in the charity application The Life You Can Save I chose to proceed with the implementation of gamified software. When the decision had been made the method for gamification design mentioned in section 2.6 was used. The steps that are included in the model and how they correlate to this particular master thesis will be described further in the sections below.

3.1

Project preparation

The initial part of this project’s gamification design consisted of identifying goals related to the intended gamified experience. Together with the product owner and the company super-visor both the intentional goals and measurement methods for the project were discussed. The results of the discussions are described in section 4.1.

3.2

Analysis

Effective altruists or people that are being close to be effective altruists are expected to be the primarily target group for The Life You Can Save application. To get a better understand-ing of the target group I participated in a meetunderstand-ing with the Secretary General of "Effektiv Altruism Sverige". The results of the meeting can be seen in section 4.2. After the meeting I consolidated that it is essential to involve the intended users as early as possible to know what the user market is demanding. I decided that the intended users should be presented the possibility to participate in a user survey where they could affect the outcome of the game mechanic implementation choice.

The gamification will be applied in an already existing application that have been developed with effective altruists in mind. There will not be any obvious dependencies since both the

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3.3. Ideation

application itself and the intended gamified implementation focus on effective altruists. That facilitates the designing process considerably since different target groups do not have to be taken into consideration.

There are certain technical constraints that have to be considered when implementing the gamification. The current application is using the BLoC architecture which means that the business logic has to be separated from the user interface. The business logic should be stored in in pure Dart code so it could be used by other platforms.

3.3

Ideation

The Playful Experience framework(PLEX) was used to generate gamification ideas. Together with the company supervisor both a PLEX brainstorming session and a PLEX scenario session were arranged. The results from these sessions can be seen in the section 4.3.1.

A list that included both previously proved gamification concepts and the results retrieved from the PLEX sessions was presented at a meeting with the project owner. In the meeting we concluded that some of the ideas were exorbitant due to Apple’s regulations which lead to a final list that contained 7 suitable implementation ideas. After the list was finalised a user survey was conducted to understand how potential users would respond to the list of gamification ideas. Both the survey questions and the results of the survey are presented in section 4.3.2. The survey were posted in a Facebook group called "Effektiv Altruism" and sent out to several people.

3.4

Design

Based on the user survey combined with an analysis concerning prevailing time constrains and complexity the most promising gamification ideas were selected for prototyping. The ideas that were chosen for prototyping can be seen in Table 4.5 under section 4.4.1.

Based on the gamification ideas in Table 4.5 I constructed four low-fidelity prototypes that were presented for the supervisor at Meepo. After some discussions a new iteration of some of the paper prototypes were constructed. After discussing different options and possibilities regarding each gamification idea me and the company supervisor estimated that the most auspicious alternative was to proceed with achievements/badges. To validate the suitability and potential of achievements/badges the MDE framework and Bartle’s model were used and can be seen in section 4.4.2.

After an extensive evaluation of achievements in a charity context it was time to make a testable prototype. The purpose with the prototype was to see how this type of implemen-tation effects users. The graphical designer of the company helped me to construct a high-fidelity prototype. I visited the Royal Institute of Technology where the prototype was tested in accordance with the Think-aloud protocol. The results of the tests where positive and can be seen in section 4.4.4. After the testing session a meeting with the project’s project leader, the graphical designer and another developer was held. In the meeting we decided that the implementation of achievements/badges should be proceeded as planned because of the re-sults from the user tests.

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3.5. Implementation

3.5

Implementation

When the user tests were done and had contributed with both concrete and positive feed-back the implementation could start. The project owner suggested that I should start by implementing an achievement called First-timer in the back-end of the application. Before implementing the user interface, everything should be up and running "behind the curtains". To decide the architecture of the beck-end I arranged a meeting with the chief technology officer of the company. When we were agreed on the architecture I created a cloud function for achievements that was triggered when updating the donation document in the Cloud Firestore database.

When the implementation of the back-end functionality was completed it was time for the front-end to be implemented. The design of the front-end was more critical than the back-end since it involved direct user interaction. Because of this the implementation was managed in a more iterative way where the design was reviewed to make sure that it was in line with the intended approach.

3.6

Evaluation

When the implementation was done it was time for the evaluation. The usability of the ap-plication was measured with a modified version of the PSSUQ. The modified version and the results of the questionnaire can be seen in section 4.6

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4

Results

4.1

Project preparation

The initial discussions of the project culminated in the three goals in Table 4.1. Table 4.1: The initial identified goals

Goal number Goal

1 Increase user retention

2 Implement a usable mechanic

3 Investigate which gamification mechanic users are interested in The most important goal for the application in general was to increase the user retention rate. Since previous research had proved gamification to be a great possibility for creating an incentive for users retention it is a natural mechanism to implement. Because of measure-ment difficulties, this particular thesis will consider usability as the primarily goal and not user retention. The concepts are though very correlated since the implementation of usable gamification implies increased user retention. The usability of the implementation will be measured with the usability quantification survey The Post-Study System Usability Question-naire. The survey can help to determine if the implementation is understandable. The third goal in Table 4.1 will be measured with a user survey containing possible implementation ideas.

4.2

Analysis

The meeting with the Secretary General of "Effektiv Altruism Sverige" resulted in some ratio-nal reasoning regarding ethical aspects in a charity application. The meeting made me realise that all types of gamification ideas were not appropriate to even contemplate for implemen-tation. It is essential to understand the core values of effective altruists and what they would appreciate in this type of application. To involve effective altruists in the process would in-crease the credibility of the implementation.

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4.3. Ideation

4.3

Ideation

Results that are related to the ideation phase of the project are presented under the sections below.

4.3.1

Results from the PLEX sessions

The PLEX brainstorming session resulted in the combination of cards illustrated in Figure 4.1

Figure 4.1: The distribution of PLEX cards in the brainstorming session

A few days after the PLEX brain storming session a new session with the PLEX scenario technique was held. Three cards were randomly drawn from the deck of PLEX cards and they turned out to be An imitation of the everyday life, Taking care of oneself or others and Investigating an object or situation. How the cards were distributed are illustrated in Figure 4.2.

Figure 4.2: The distribution of PLEX cards in the scenario session

The seven most promising ideas from the PLEX sessions and from previous research are il-lustrated in Table 4.2.

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4.3. Ideation

4.3.2

Results from the user survey

Table 4.2: Questions in the survey

Question number Questions

1 Would you appreciate a customised thank you message containing information about the organisation that you just donated to? 2 Would you appreciate if there was a possibility to create

a donation team together with your friends? 3 Would you appreciate if there was a highscore-list inside

the application?

4 Would you appreciate if there was possible to set up individual donation goals?

5 Would you appreciate if you got a daily gift inside the application? For example money to donate. 6 Would you appreciate if there was a possibility to earn

achievements inside the application?

7 Would you appreciate if there was possible to set up common donation goals for the team.

8 Did you look at the design prototype before you answered this survey?

Question 1-7 had five different answer possibilities where 1 represented not at all and 5 rep-resented very much. The eighth question in the survey just had two answer possibilities, yes and no. How the answers of the questions are distributed are illustrated in Figure 4.3 - 4.10. For Figure 4.3 - 4.9 the colour coding can be seen in Table 4.3. In Figure 4.10 green represents yes and red represents no.

Table 4.3: Colour coding Color Questions Orange 5 Blue 4 Red 3 Green 2 Yellow 1

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4.3. Ideation 40 % 26.7 % 20 % 6.7 % 6.7 % Figure 4.3: Question 1 26.7 % 33.3 % 33.3 % 6.7 % Figure 4.4: Question 2 13.3 % 26.7 % 33.3 % 13.3 % 13.3 % Figure 4.5: Question 3 20 % 40 % 26.7 % 13.3 % Figure 4.6: Question 4 33.3 % 40 % 6.7 % 13.3 % 6.7 % Figure 4.7: Question 5 26.7 % 33.3 % 13.3 % 26.7 % Figure 4.8: Question 6 26.7 % 53.3 % 20 % Figure 4.9: Question 7 80 % 20 % Figure 4.10: Question 8

In Table 4.4 the mean value and the standard deviation for each question except question 8 are presented.

Table 4.4: Mean and standard deviation of the survey Question Mean µ Standard Deviation σ

Q1 3.87 1.2 Q2 3.8 0.91 Q3 3.13 1.2 Q4 3.67 0.94 Q5 3.8 1.2 Q6 3.6 1.14 Q7 4.07 0.7

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4.4. Design

4.4

Design

Results that are related to the design phase of the project are presented under the sections below.

4.4.1

Ideas for prototyping

The list of ideas chosen for prototyping is illustrated in Table 4.5

Table 4.5: The gamification ideas that were chosen to prototype

Question number Gamification idea

1 A customised thank you message

2 Create a donation team together with friends

6 Achievements

7 Common donation goals for the team

4.4.2

Evaluation with the MDE Framework

Mechanics

1. Setup mechanics The experience will be perceived in a virtual environment when do-nations have been executed. If an achievement is reached there will be an animation on the thank you page. For this thesis the competition will be individual where each user in-ternally collects different kind of badges. Some of the achievements are finite and must be reached under specific circumstances.

2. Rule mechanics Since there are no unpredictability involved in the achievement imple-mentation the conditions are deterministic. Some achievements will be objective-based and have time constraints that forces players to act within a specific time period. 3. Progression mechanics Since progress mechanics dictate the reinforcements in a

ex-perience both the progress bars and the levels become really important. The imple-mented achievements should visualise the current progress and have different levels. Each achievement has to be salience which increases the desirability. It would be disad-vantageously the add too many achievements that are too easy to collect.

Dynamics

The dynamics are produced by how the designer chooses the mechanics. Since the achieve-ments for this thesis will be individual the competition structure will also be individual. This can induce a individual competitive instinct.

Emotions

The achievements can develop different emotions in different situations. For example enjoy-ment can be retrieved when getting an achieveenjoy-ment while disappointenjoy-ment also is a possibility when the user realises that it is a long way before reaching a desired achievement.

4.4.3

Evaluation with Bartle’s model

Since the incentive for achievements is to collect badges the primarily addressed audience will be Achievers. They appeal to be emphasised by acting ON the environment.

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