Recent years have seen an escalating interest in the use of digital games in pursuit of education... more Recent years have seen an escalating interest in the use of digital games in pursuit of educational goals. The present research also examined the impact of using digital games on learning in higher education. Female participants (N=46) from a women university in Pakistan were assigned to an experimental condition. The effect of game design with moderating effect of 3D dimension modelling, game contents and social context was examined on learning effectiveness. Results found significant impact of game design with moderating effect of 3D dimension modelling and game contents on learning satisfaction. However, results did not show a significant impact of collaboration on learning satisfaction during the experimental play session. Results are discussed in terms of the potential for higher education learning games and technology to increase students' perceived learning effectiveness. This study reinforces the use of digital games in higher education. It also emphasize the necessity of further research to evaluate the academic value of digital games in students' learning and knowledge retention. Introduction The introduction of educational technologies has been bringing tremendous changes in the landscape of education. Majority academic institutes across the world have adopted many novel forms of learning and teaching methods and tools. For example, " reference schools such as Harvard Business School have meant to make a progress, from the evolution of paper based study cases into simulations and interactive case studies where the learners' could play a realistic situation, to learning by doing " (Srikant, Garvin & Cullen, 2010 as cited in Popescu, Romero, & Usart, 2013). Digital Game-based Learning (DGBL) is one of the popular tool that has been gaining attention of researchers in various disciplines. A plethora of researchers have provided the evidence that using digital games in education can provide multiple benefits like retaining memory longer, motivation to learn, developing skills like problem solving, planning and strategic thinking etc. (Shi & Shih,2015). Learning via digital games is guided by certain rules and goals which helps learners to learn in an organized way by creating step by step real experiences which enhance interest among them and strengthen their learning effectiveness (Tsai, Yu, & Hsiao, 2010). Thus, digital games can be considered as a crucial teaching tool in future (Becker, 2007). Hence, study of effects of digital games is worthy of examination. The merger of information technology tools into education have brought several challenges for both professions. The IT professionals and the educationist both have different frame of works. Hence, when two fields are brought together, it might hamper the intended outcomes of certain actions e.g. using digital games for learning. In order to get the desired benefits of digital game based learning, certain learning as well as technical factors of the games need to be considered. As Shi and Shih (2015) pointed out that " Game designers are able to create interesting games but do not know how to maintain the quality of teaching materials in a game, whereas educators focused on effective educational materials but do not know how to create interesting games ". Thus, in this study an investigation has been made to explore the factors of digital games that can affect the learning effectiveness of learner. The framework presented in this paper help researchers to create and use more interesting educational games for the intended learning outcomes.
Recent years have seen an escalating interest in the use of digital games in pursuit of education... more Recent years have seen an escalating interest in the use of digital games in pursuit of educational goals. The present research also examined the impact of using digital games on learning in higher education. Female participants (N=46) from a women university in Pakistan were assigned to an experimental condition. The effect of game design with moderating effect of 3D dimension modelling, game contents and social context was examined on learning effectiveness. Results found significant impact of game design with moderating effect of 3D dimension modelling and game contents on learning satisfaction. However, results did not show a significant impact of collaboration on learning satisfaction during the experimental play session. Results are discussed in terms of the potential for higher education learning games and technology to increase students' perceived learning effectiveness. This study reinforces the use of digital games in higher education. It also emphasize the necessity of further research to evaluate the academic value of digital games in students' learning and knowledge retention. Introduction The introduction of educational technologies has been bringing tremendous changes in the landscape of education. Majority academic institutes across the world have adopted many novel forms of learning and teaching methods and tools. For example, " reference schools such as Harvard Business School have meant to make a progress, from the evolution of paper based study cases into simulations and interactive case studies where the learners' could play a realistic situation, to learning by doing " (Srikant, Garvin & Cullen, 2010 as cited in Popescu, Romero, & Usart, 2013). Digital Game-based Learning (DGBL) is one of the popular tool that has been gaining attention of researchers in various disciplines. A plethora of researchers have provided the evidence that using digital games in education can provide multiple benefits like retaining memory longer, motivation to learn, developing skills like problem solving, planning and strategic thinking etc. (Shi & Shih,2015). Learning via digital games is guided by certain rules and goals which helps learners to learn in an organized way by creating step by step real experiences which enhance interest among them and strengthen their learning effectiveness (Tsai, Yu, & Hsiao, 2010). Thus, digital games can be considered as a crucial teaching tool in future (Becker, 2007). Hence, study of effects of digital games is worthy of examination. The merger of information technology tools into education have brought several challenges for both professions. The IT professionals and the educationist both have different frame of works. Hence, when two fields are brought together, it might hamper the intended outcomes of certain actions e.g. using digital games for learning. In order to get the desired benefits of digital game based learning, certain learning as well as technical factors of the games need to be considered. As Shi and Shih (2015) pointed out that " Game designers are able to create interesting games but do not know how to maintain the quality of teaching materials in a game, whereas educators focused on effective educational materials but do not know how to create interesting games ". Thus, in this study an investigation has been made to explore the factors of digital games that can affect the learning effectiveness of learner. The framework presented in this paper help researchers to create and use more interesting educational games for the intended learning outcomes.
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