[Dutch-chapter] Meeting of Dutch and Flemish game researchers (DiGRA / AGS). 23 April 2010 Utrecht

[Jeroen Jansz]

Beste mensen, Dear all,

It is our pleasure to invite you to our next meeting on Friday, April 
23, 1500-1800 hrs.
We will meet at our familiar venue: the Faculty Club "Helios", 
Kanunnikenzaal, address: Achter de Dom 7a, Utrecht. 
http://www.helios.uu.nl/

The theme for this meeting is 'serious' applications of serious games. 
We are very happy to welcome two distinguished speakers, Joske Houtkamp 
and Menno Deen.
Both will talk about their own recent research.

The program:

15:00 Welcome (with coffee and tea)

15:15 Presentation by Joske Houtkamp
    (Dept. of Information and Computing Sciences, Utrecht University &
    AGS, the Centre for Advanced Gaming and Simulation).

Who's afraid of virtual darkness?

    Most people have an innate fear of darkness. Ambient darkness 
conceals potential dangers, and creates a feeling of insecurity about 
orientation and escape routes. There is some evidence that fear of 
darkness also occurs in immersive virtual environments. Moreover, in 
commercial desktop games, low-key lighting is often used to evoke 
suspense and dread.
    Influencing the emotional response of the trainee in serious games 
and training applications  is a valuable means to prepare a trainee to 
perform in a diversity of circumstances. In two experiments we explore 
the effects of darkness on the response of the viewers of a virtual 
environment on a desktop computer. Can virtual darkness be used to 
elicit anxiety or arousal?


16:15 Presentation by Menno Deen (Fontys University of Applied Sciences 
& Ranj's game researcher)

Games that Motivate to Learn: Design Serious Games by Identified Regulations

    It is commonly acknowledged that intrinsically motivated learning 
makes for better students. Though, facilitating students to become 
intrinsically motivated to learn is difficult, if not, impossible to 
accomplish. As every student has different and personal intrinsic needs, 
the design of regulations that satisfy intrinsic needs may seem an 
unfruitful approach to serious game design. Inspired by research to the 
beta-version of the second language game CheckOut!, I propose a 
different approach to serious game design, based on identified regulations.
    Identified regulations are negotiations with personal valued rules. 
The regulations can be positioned between external regulations (based on 
punishments and rewards) and intrinsic regulations (based on a personal 
willingness to act). To develop identified regulations, game designers 
should create a correspondence between the game regulations and the 
student's perceptions about the educational instruction.
    To accomplish this fit, game designers should not conceal the 
learning with(in) a game, but should explicitly communicate the 
constructed knowledge to the player. Progressive feedback, the 
availability of various learning styles in the game, and the embedding 
of the game in a social environment, might satisfy students' needs for 
competence, autonomy and relatedness to significant others. When these 
needs are satisfied within the context of the educational instructions, 
students might become motivated to learn during play, and even when the 
game is over.

17:15 Drinks

Participation in this meeting is free. It is necessary, though, to 
register on the following website:
http://gate.gameresearch.nl/index.php?pageID=105 

Kind regards,

Marinka Copier (DiGRA), Mark Overmars (AGS) and Jeroen Jansz (DiGRA)

Our last meeting this academic year will be on Friday, June 18, 2010


-- 

Prof. Dr. Jeroen Jansz

FHKW - Department of Media and Communication
Erasmus University Rotterdam
P.O. Box 1738
NL-3000 DR Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Phone: 	+31 10 408 24 53 
Email:	jansz at fhk.eur.nl
Website:	http://www.fhk.eur.nl/personal/jeroen_jansz/bio/
 
Visiting address:
L-Building, Room L2-33
Woudestein Campus, Erasmus University Rotterdam
Burgemeester Oudlaan 50, 3062 PA Rotterdam

Route and Location:
http://www.eur.nl/english/addresses/


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