~ A record of places on the web I want to remember ~

Concern about gamification has brought about a healthy discussion about its limits – but have we really understood the extent to which games themselves are already subject to a stifling of free play by explicit rewards like Achievements?

In psychology, the overjustification effect refers to situations in which offering an explicit incentive – money or prizes – reduces a person’s intrinsic motivation to perform a task. The earliest demonstrations of this effect were Mark Lepper and Richard Nisbett’s experiments on children aged 3 to 5 years, who had been showing an intrinsic interest in drawing. They divided the kids into three groups: in the first, a “good player” ribbon was offered for drawing. In the second, the ribbon was also awarded but it was not announced in advance. The third group was a control. Watching the children later, they observed that when playing freely the first group was significantly less interested in drawing, while the other groups behaviour did not change. They concluded that expecting rewards undermines intrinsic motivation in activities that were previously enjoyable.

Paul, the lead author, interviewed sheepdog trialer Damian Wilson about his interactions with his dog, a border collie named Yandarra Whiskey. Damian and Whiskey gave Paul a demonstration of the techniques used in sheepdog competitions as they together tried to move a mob of three sheep. In a competition in New South Wales, a trainer and dog have to move three sheep who have never been herded through a difficult obstacle course, and the trainer loses points if he (or, less frequently, she) breaks from a slow, measured pace walking the course. The rules mean that the dog itself must be trained until it anticipates the sheep’s reactions, and understands, on some level, what dog and trainer, together, are trying to accomplish. Although the trialer may give commands, the dog, too, is a kind of expert.

You kids today don’t know what real gaming is. You talk about your Call of Honors and Gears of Halos like it was spun gold coming straight from God’s butt. Back in our day, there were real games… inventive, crazy, hard games that charged a quarter for each play and made you stand up in front of a giant wooden cabinet as you played. And we had to walk fifteen miles in the snow to play ’em. Uphill! Both ways!

Wait! Come back here, you whippersnappers. This is important. You’re going to sit here and you’re going to let us regale you with tales and videos of what made the golden age of arcades so special, or so help me I will throw that WiiStation 360 of yours right out the window, dagnabbit.