The effects of gamification on students’ academic achievement: a meta-analysis study

ABSTRACT

Whether gamification is an organized structure that contributes to student achievement, a simple pontification process or total nonsense is a matter of debate. In such, this study was conducted to provide a scientific answer while exhibiting the gamification effect on student achievement with the meta-analysis method, which is based on experimental research that investigates the effect of gamification on student achievement between 2010 and 2016. As a result of the completed meta-analysis, a common effect size value that was estimated by compiling experimental studies was found to be 0.557. This value shows that gamification has a moderately positive (Cohen, 1988) effect on student achievement. It is exhibited that there is no publication bias regarding determining the effect’s validity. Calculated 0.557 Hedges’ g value’s omega square equivalent is .072. This value shows that gamification has added 7.2% positive value to academic achievement according to 45 experimental results involving 3,487 students from different countries.

KEYWORDS:

• Gamification
• meta-analysis
• game design
• academic achievement

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

İbrahim Yıldırım

Ibrahim Yildirim is working at Harran University, Sanliurfa, Turkey. He earned his PhD in 2016 from Gaziantep University. His research interests focus on curriculum development, assessment and evaluation in education and educational technologies. His recent publication appeared in “The Internet and Higher Education” journal with the topic of gamification and other international peer-reviewed journals. He teaches courses about research methods and educational technologies at both undergraduate and graduate levels.

Sedat Şen

Sedat Sen is working at Harran University as PhD, Sanliurfa, Turkey. He earned his PhD in 2014 from University of Georgia. His research interests focus on quantitative methods, applied statistics, and psychometrics. His recent publications appeared in Applied Psychological Measurement, International Journal of Testing and other international peer-reviewed journals. He teaches courses about research methods, educational measurement, and statistics at both undergraduate and graduate levels.