The term gamification first appeared when Nick Pelling coined the “deliberately ugly” word in 2002, when tasked with developing a game-like interface for ATM and vending machines.

But gamification, while not a part of our lexicon until recently, has been around for centuries and played a role in significant advancements. The Periodic Table of Elements, an iconic symbol in science, was created by Russian scientist Dmitri Mendeleev. He wrote the names and properties of the sixty-five known elements on individual cards, hoping to predict new ones. After falling asleep at his desk while moving the cards around, he awoke to see the repeating pattern in the elements’ behavior, making him one of the first scientists to use gamification to complete an educational task. 

Gamification in Skills Development

Fast forward to this century’s technology, and the leap to gamified skills development is a natural one. As Dmitri Mendeleev demonstrated, games leverage the human tendency to influence one’s thinking process as a method to architecture human behavior to induce engagement, innovation, and productivity.

1. According to the International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education, gamification increased:
   • 12.23% in retention
   • 7.03% overall performance 

2. The U.S. Department of Defense uses gamification to safely train soldiers due to an astounding:
   • 11% increase in knowledge recall 
   • 14% increase in procedural knowledge
   • 9% greater retention of knowledge

3. Scientific studies show that students who learn with gamified content that includes prizes push course completion from under 20% to 90%.

Gamification in Workforce Development

Engaging youth about careers with mobile gaming has also already proven to be a valuable tool in workforce development, as it offers a unique opportunity to engage with the next generation in job exploration using their favorite form of entertainment. In fact, a mobile, gamified approach to workforce development checks just about every box in recruiting today’s sustainable, vetted talent pipeline. Here’s why:

1. Mobile games reach a broader, diverse audience, including those who may not be interested in or have access to traditional career exploration resources, including rural and inner-city communities.
2. Players can engage in experiential career discovery, allowing them to engage in simulated work environments and learn about different career paths in a hands-on experience. 
3. Industry-relevant skills are developed, including problem-solving, critical thinking, and teamwork. 
4. Mobile technology can directly connect players with post-secondary pathways and employers around them based on interest and proficiencies and their location.

What more?

• 95% of Gen Z have access to smartphones
• It’s where they spend more than 7+ hours a day 
• 90% of them classify themselves as mobile gamers

Mobile gaming presents an unprecedented opportunity for industry to reach their future talent pool wherever they are, on their phones, with gamified content that engages, influences and skills. Industry videos watched only once, annual job fairs, or overly-tasked educators with limited time to invest in career awareness are not enough to fill the talent shortage estimated to cost industry a $1.2 trillion loss this decade. By making career exploration fun, accessible, and interactive, mobile games can inspire young people to pursue careers in a variety of industries and build a strong, diverse workforce for the future.

Interested in a workforce game demo? See how states are using free-to-play mobile gamification to create awareness and access for youth to skilled careers in their own backyard.

By the end of this year, there will be 79.6 million digital gamers in the US, or more than half of our population. Industry growth is accelerating thanks to heavy engagement of younger gamers (ages 13 to 17), 90% of whom classify themselves as gamers, and prefer video games over any other form of digital media, including music, videos and social media. 

Game-based learning is expected to be one the fastest-growing gaming markets, driven by the need to improve student education post-COVID. Considered an active learning technique, students are motivated and engaged in game-based learning because it’s unique, and the immediate feedback that learners and educators receive as a result is an important feature that both learners and educators benefit from more quickly than traditional methods. 

One of digital games’ most cognitively significant features includes simulations that allow students to get a firsthand experience with material. According to research, it’s better for students to come into direct contact with the reality they’re studying, instead of just reading, talking, and listening about it. We remember up to 90% of what we say and do, provided we are actively involved in real activities related to imitating experiences.

Additional benefits of game-based learning include: 

1. Motivation: Students are the main characters in the story and their success is rewarded with medals, extra lives, bonuses, etc, holding their interest in learning.

2. Opportunities to practice: Students can apply the knowledge they acquire without getting into dangerous situations, ie; flight and navigation simulators

3. Quicker response times: Researchers at Rochester University reported that games improve troubleshooting skills by posing time-sensitive problems.

4. Teamwork: The Institute for the Future reports that games boost teamwork in problem solving.

5. Creativity, focus and visual memory: The University of California has found that games stimulate these aspects by setting goals that require concentration, imagination and remembering details to achieve them.

6. Strategy and leadership: According to Pittsburgh University, video games put players in command, honing their abilities to resolve disputes, interact with other players and make decisions.

7. Critical thinking: Monterrey Institute of Technology published an article underlining the underlying ethical, philosophical and social basis of these games, and their ability to make players think and improve their critical thinking.

Bain’s analysis forecasts that global revenue for games could grow by more than 50% over the next five years, suggesting that developers are banking on evidence that gaming will take consumers’ time from other forms of media and be the foundational platform for both other media and non-media experiences. 

Additionally, advancements in game engines are making it easier to develop higher-fidelity games, becoming a key development platform for other entertainment experiences, and improvements in 3-D graphics that transfer to applications in other industries such as healthcare, advanced manufacturing and construction.

Considering game-based learning is just in its nascent stages based on most recent, post-pandemic circumstances, this means we can expect not just schools to embrace this medium for learning and training, but industry as well.

What’s one of your favorite digital learning games? We’d love to hear from you.

Skillsgapp’s CEO Tina Zwolinski discusses how Skillsgapp transforms manufacturing and cybersecurity career awareness, access to job pathways and corresponding skills development into fun, engaging mobile video games. Watch or listen here.

By Adam Bruns The digitizing of the economy is pervasive, whether you’re performing quality control in an automated manufacturing plant; undergoing a medical procedure; operating a container crane at a backed-up West Coast port; launching fabrication of a 3D-printed prototype; or putting the finishing touches on a breakthrough architectural design.

Could using our own digits, senses and synapses in the pervasive playing of video games deliver a competitive advantage to a world hungry for IT skills, systems thinking and interdisciplinary creativity? Video game development and competitive esports programs at colleges and universities around the world are counting on it. Read More.

By Beth Ann Townsend, Narrative Designer at skillsgapp //  

Video Games Teach Empathy & Other Hard-to-Teach Skills

Ready to bust some more gaming myths? The second blog in this series combats outdated and unfounded fears of video games by highlighting their universal nature, cooperative space, and potential for skills development. This third installment looks to similar positive traits in a demonstration of video games’ power over the mind and heart as a force for good. 

The incomparable firsthand experiences that video games generate can put players from any background into new circumstances, facilitating the formation of critical social-emotional skills (and global awareness, like I talk about in the last blog post). Video games allow people to interact “firsthand” with concepts, places, and times they otherwise wouldn’t be able to experience, from the streets of modern Hong Kong to the rooftops of Renaissance Venice. We can see the wider world on a very personal level while moving through a story in someone else’s shoes, defying the limits of wherever our own feet can take us. Games have the power to spark conversation, induce awareness, and share a diverse range of voices. 

Social-emotional skills and gaming

It’s why educators are advocating for specially designed video games that teach empathy: “Perspective-taking through player agency drives empathetic thinking.” Games put their audiences in the driver’s seat and provide active engagement with the material, distinguishing playing video games from the more passive experience of watching a video. Because the player has an impact on the game environment to varying extents, and because the player is taking on a new point of view, they are in an ideal position to learn and empathize. 

Indeed, a game designed by University of Wisconsin-Madison for middle schoolers was found to improve empathy in young learners. In this game, Crystals of Kaydor, players assume the role of a crash-landed robot and must successfully identify the emotions of aliens in order to find a way home. Researchers discovered that the kids’ social-emotional skill development through the game actually changed neural connections in their brains. “The realization that these skills are … trainable with video games is important,” lead researcher Tammi Kral says, “because they are predictors of emotional well-being and health throughout life and can be practiced any time.”

This is a big deal. We’re finding that not only can games engage kids with each other, allow them to realize their own creative and intellectual potentials, and meet them wherever they may be; games can also prepare the next generation for the workforce by equipping them with “hard-to-teach” skills. These include soft skills like collaboration, communication, creativity, and critical thinking, as well as social-emotional skills like the abilities to relate with others, make appropriate decisions, maintain awareness of other people’s emotions, and understand one’s own thoughts and feelings.

Professor Matthew Farber (Assistant Professor of Technology, Innovation, and Pedagogy at the University of Northern Colorado) underscores the importance of such skills in his article entitled “Teaching Empathy With Video Games.” He calls them “21^st-century competencies that students should possess.” Farber poses the question of whether or not playing video games can make children better aware of their own emotions and become more sensitive to the non-verbal behavior of others, and he concludes his article by saying yes, yes they can. As a result of playing games like Crystals of Kaydor and practicing social-emotional skills, students will be able to “compete and innovate in today’s interconnected, global economy,” Farber says.  

Games, empathy, and the next workforce generation

When the player has the ability to make choices in another’s shoes—when they can witness something firsthand and feel like they have a personal stake in the matter—then they can take ownership of their experience and find themself relating to different persons and places. They’re practicing empathy. In games like that, students can exercise the developing parts of their brain, thus making themselves world- and workplace-ready, prepared for tomorrow’s challenges intellectually, socially, and emotionally. 

What hard-to-teach skills do you think every student should learn before high school graduation?

By Beth Ann Townsend, Narrative Designer at skillsgapp //  

Video Games Are Preparing Our Next Workforce for Global Leadership

In the last post—the first installment to this series—I talk about how video games have the power to bring people together. They disregard distance. And because of that, video games are also able to bridge the gap between cultural differences large and small, creating truly global communities. What’s more, the collaborative nature of video game production ensures endless teachable moments and exposure to diverse perspectives beyond the bounds of the game. Playing video games and developing them can help students learn about themselves and others while picking up skills that will prepare them for a career in any field they pursue.

The global impact of video games on under-resourced students 

This past April, Rochester Institute of Technology’s international game prototyping course gave students the chance to collaborate in a virtual cultural exchange program and establish commonalities despite cultural differences. In that same month, the U.S. Department of State announced the conception of a video game diplomacy program, which seeks to connect almost 3,000 students from the US, Bahrain, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates. The exchange program will bring under-resourced teens from Detroit, Atlanta, and New York City into partnership with Middle Eastern students for the united purpose of developing social impact games. In a conversation with The Washington Post about the program, Marie Royce, who has served as Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs since 2018, says that “young people have something in common[:] … They play video games. … It’s important to have initiatives around gaming [because] it’s an opportunity to give everybody a chance to have an exchange.” 

These recent efforts to utilize the universal medium of games build upon previous initiatives like Digital Play for Global Citizens, a publication from Sesame Workshop and the Center for Global Education at Asia Society. Digital Play for Global Citizens introduces a “vast landscape of digital resources … and suggests some innovative ways to nurture our young learners into macro-minded citizens.” In this increasingly connected world, our up-and-coming workforce must be prepared to answer questions and resolve issues that span the globe, and video games have proven to be effective tools for teaching students collaborative and inclusive practices.

Game development promotes skills development

Cultural exchange projects help to promote peace, growth, and understanding, and through the State Department’s Game Exchange program (in partnership with the nonprofit Games for Change), Royce hopes to foster diplomacy while also building essential skills in students here at home, no matter their income level or personal identity. She addresses the future of Gen Z, stating, “In creating video games, people develop tremendous skills…. [They’re] able to think critically [and] develop STEM skills and … leadership skills.” Collaboration, communication, and compromise are essential to video game production, as creators must work together to realize a cohesive vision, but those soft skills aren’t all that young leaders can grow. Like Royce says, game development gives students the chance to practice math, art, logic, storytelling, coding, and more, because it’s a cross-section of so many different disciplines—disciplines that are needed in the wider world right now.

Gen Z has entered the game, championing diversity and inclusion

In order for the U.S. to ensure the success of our next generation of leaders, workers, and creators, we need to advocate for inclusivity and big-picture thinking alongside the hard skills that get so much attention in schools. Video games—as illustrated by the RIT virtual exchange course, the U.S. State Department’s Game Exchange diplomacy program, and the Joan Ganz Cooney Center’s Digital Play for Global Citizens—can “promote global citizenship,” let us explore new “boundaries, borders, and geography,” and help us all develop “empathy and understanding of diversity.” Game development encourages cooperation with others near and far at the same time it teaches critical skills. 

As the president of Games for Change, Susanna Pollack, explains to The Washington Post, video games can transcend mere entertainment and “be significant drivers of social impact,” because they are not confined within any one nation for any one kind of person. “Like other forms of media,” Pollack continues, “games can address important social topics and meet people where they are”—whether that’s in a high school in the USA or one in the UAE. By bringing together people across the globe and empowering students with new skills and knowledge, video game diplomacy programs are achieving a unique blend of civic engagement and practical application that illustrates the versatility of games and their positive impacts around the world. 

What talents would you like to see more of in the workforce right now? Collaboration, inclusion, STEM skills, global citizenship…?

Video game developer Skillsgapp transforms skills and behavioral development into free-to-play mobile gaming technology designed to engage, educate, and entertain middle and high schoolers.

The Tobacco Prevention Toolkit was developed by Bonnie Halpern-Felsher, PhD, Professor of Pediatrics and Director of the Stanford REACH Lab at the Stanford University School of Medicine. Using free content from the Tobacco Prevention Toolkit, the game was developed to teach students in grades 6-12 basic refusal skills, share important tobacco prevention messaging and encourage activities in their schools and communities that can foster local policy change. This approach would work to address health disparities among vulnerable populations and reduce tobacco and vape use.

As mobile video games gain greater reach and sophistication levels that deliver more realistic, entertaining, and challenging experiences, unprecedented narrative is being incorporated into gameplay that influences players’ behavior in meaningful ways. As we leverage this preferred medium to prepare our next generation for meaningful careers in previously stigmatized industries within manufacturing, including life sciences, cyber/IT, aerospace, and auto, many behaviorists agree on incorporating these four disciplines into gameplay to affect change.

Four In-Game Disciplines that Can Change Behavior in Gen Z

1. Motivation

Self-determination theory identifies three primary psychological needs that drive most behaviors: 

• the need for competence, or a feeling of effectiveness at completing tasks

• the need for autonomy, or the sense of freedom to choose one’s own behavior

• the need for relatedness, or of feeling tied to others through relationships and shared values.

These basic needs tend to motivate behavior in an individual, independent of extrinsic rewards. By design, video games check each of these boxes via challenges that can be repurposed with increased difficulty, directly promoting and improving desired skills development, which can make workforce readiness a lot more rewarding…and fun.

2. Reinforcement

In contrast to intrinsic motivation, video games can also use extrinsic rewards to reinforce desired behaviors, including task-noncontingent rewards, and rewards of glory. The former can consist of kudos and likes from other players in the game, or by in-game mentorship from industry and educators, all of which promote feelings of relatedness and autonomy. Rewards of glory consist of points, achievements, badges, or animations, and can support competence needs by providing feedback and shareable bragging rights. 

3. Personalization

Gen Z is more likely to devote cognitive effort and attention toward an activity they perceive to be personally relevant. By tailoring game narrative to align with their values, game designers — and industry — can persuade players in a way other forms of persuasion may not. Creating game characters a player identifies with, or by casting the player themselves as the main character is one way. Another way is to incorporate desired goals into the game narrative. As an example, BeatNic Boulevard is a new simulation-style, free-to-play mobile game where students in San Bernardino County, California — in collaboration with Stanford University’s Tobacco Prevention Toolkit — learn the importance of living a tobacco-free lifestyle. As students play the video game, they learn and recognize the impact of tobacco-use, vaping and how the sale of these products negatively affect schools and communities, eradicating false perceptions perpetuated by the tobacco industry.  

4. Proteus Effect

The Proteus Effect represents the experience of embodying an avatar in a virtual environment, which affects multiple aspects of cognition and behavior of the player. Being in a virtual world allows users to control many aspects of their appearance they cannot easily change in the real world, allowing a player to “try things on” in an arena void of stereotypes. This is especially powerful in breaking down stereotypes within trade-specific careers.

Mobile Gaming is a Viable Skills-Training Medium

The number of active mobile gamers worldwide is over 2.2 billion today. As industry, states, and regions look to grow their workforce-ready talent pools, mobile gaming should be at the top of their list as a proven, customizable training and recruitment tool that can scale to reach this entire next generation.

What skills development or behavioral change would you like to see incorporated into mobile games? Comment below.