Evaluating student perceptions of using a game-based approach to aid learning: Braincept

Abstract

Gamification in higher education has steadily been gaining traction as a useful addition to the diversity of learning resources available to both teachers and students. We have invented a card-based, role-playing team game called ‘Braincept’ to help aid pharmacology learning for medical students. The aims of the current study are to determine whether the students who played the game perceived any benefit to their pharmacology learning and to gauge any learning gain as a result of playing the game. Here, we present questionnaire data and thematic analysis collected from students who played Braincept along with our data on learning gain associated with play. Our data show that this style of gamified learning has a positive effect on student confidence in handling pharmacological knowledge and that there was measurable learning gain after playing the game.

Keywords:

• Gamification
• pharmacology
• learning and teaching
• andragogy
• pedagogy

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank UnLtd for their generous development funding of our game though a ‘Try It’ social enterprise award. We would also like to thank Dr. David Harvey for his work on development of the game and Keele University School of Medicine for their continued support of the Braincept project.