Gameful Design is design of learning environments (broadly interpreted) where game mechanics are intrinsic, in order to induce intrinsic motivation in the learner, similar to the motivation of someone playing a video game.

To cause this motivation, Skill Atoms are chained together. Players learn something, use it and receive a payoff, and this then enables them to learn and use the next thing.

This is different to gamification where elements of game design such as points and badges are added to an existing system, which is a more extrinsic motivation.

I see the problem with gamification is that it misses out the learning and enabling the next thing parts, and just focuses on doing something and getting a payoff.

Gameful Design relies on the assertion that people are motivated by learning whenever their basic needs are met, and that this is the basis for play for all ages. In gamified systems the payoff of points isn’t enough to encourage use by itself so you end up with rewards for points and then you’ve potentially got players cheating the system because the rewards are more important to them than the learning.

A teacher in TES a few weeks ago described what happened when he moved his Year 3 (about age 8) class away from points for completing work. He found that his students were as motivated as before and during a class debate it was decided that learning was a reward in itself – a move from a gamified system to a gameful one.

See papers by Dichev, Deterding and the article by Cook.

The player is an entity that is driven, consciously or unconsciously, to learn new skills high in perceived value (Cook, 2007)

Skill
A behaviour that the player uses to manipulate the world, which can be conceptual, for example navigation, or physical, such as hammering a nail (Cook, 2007).

Driven to learn
People will begin playing by default if not pursuing activities related to food or shelter, described by Biederman and Vessel (2006) as Infovore behaviour in an article investigating the changes in the brain in response to visual input:

“Neuropsychologists have found that visual input activates receptors in the parts of the brain associated with pleasure and reward, and that the brain associates new images with old while also responding strongly to new ones. Using functional MRI imaging and other findings, they are exploring how human beings are “infovores” whose brains love to learn.”

Fun is derived from the act of mastering knowledge, skills and tools. You experience joy when you understand something so fully that you can use that knowledge to manipulate your environment for the better (Cook, 2007).

Perceived Value
Players pursue skills with high perceived value over skills with low perceived value. Play is a deeply pragmatic activity – we play because we expect to eventually harvest value from our activities and we stop playing when we fail to find that utility. The perception of value is more important than objective value (Cook, 2007).

References

• Biederman, I. and Vessel, E. (2006) Perceptual Pleasure and the Brain, Sigma Xi, 94 249-255.
• Cook, D (2007) The Chemistry of Game Design [blog]. 19 July. Available from: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/129948/the_chemistry_of_game_design.php [accessed 4 March 2017]