How many times have I started off my blog with ‘According to Wikipedia’? Too many times probably yet according to Wikipedia: ‘Gamification is the strategic attempt to enhance systems, services, organizations (sic), and activities by creating similar experiences to those experienced when playing games in order to motivate and engage users.’ (Hamari, J. (2019). “Gamification”. The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology.)
The intention is that by making something more like a game, with an element of competition, it makes it more likely that people will engage with the process and, perhaps more importantly, stick with it. Everyone is competitive, to a degree and likes to win, don’t they?
I see this everyday with Duolingo, the American educational technology company that produces learning apps. I say everyday as I am on a 2,992 day streak, using it to learn a few different languages, mostly Dutch, Spanish and French though I am toying with the idea of trying Hindi. It’s a long story.
Each time I log on I am invited to compete with my friends (only two of whom I have ever met). I am in a league and encouraged to win to move up and not be demoted to lower leagues. I am currently in pearl and now there are at least two leagues above me. To move up you need to score points which you can do by completing lessons.
There is more to it than that. By achieving certain objectives you can get double points for 15 or even 30 minutes. This encourages you to do another lesson or two. Every few days there is also a challenge which pits you against a colleague to try and achieve something in a set time (perfect lessons or total points for example). There is also a monthly badge on offer for completing daily quests.
Gamification certainly encourages you to engage with the platform but herein lies the rub. Some lessons are easier than others. For example, in a normal lesson you need to get 16 answers correct for 15 points, while in a practice lesson you need to get 10 correct for 20 points. If you say you are unable to speak or listen, the number of correct answers can be as few as 6. These can be double of course, circumstances permitting.
To learn a language you need to keep doing lessons and some practice but gamification makes it more worthwhile to do practice than lessons. You end up encouraged to chase points rather than knowledge, thus defeating the objective. It makes me wonder if Duolingo’s objective is indeed to keep me on the platform.
Of course I have a strategy to deal with this. Gamification is fine but be careful that it does not encourage the player away from their original objectives.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 