JunkCorp: A Narrative Task Framing Approach to Gamified Citizen Science
Authors
Sørensen, Martin Dahl ; Hyttel, Marcus Otterstrøm ; Nielsen, Anne
Term
4. term
Education
Publication year
2023
Submitted on
2023-05-25
Pages
12
Abstract
We investigated whether framing tasks as a story can motivate volunteers in citizen science as effectively as classic points-based gamification. The task asked people to mark and label litter in photos (image segmentation and annotation). We built two versions of the same mobile Android app in Unity: one with only points-based gamification elements and one, called JunkCorp, that wove the same task into a narrative and allowed users to keep contributing after the story ended. Both versions included a leaderboard, progress bars, and group tasks to keep the comparison fair. We assessed motivation using established questionnaires (the User Motivation Inventory and the Gameful Experience Questionnaire, GAMEFULQUEST) and interviews. Users of the JunkCorp version showed higher scores for intrinsic motivation and for identified and integrated regulation—forms of internal motivation based on interest, personal value, and fit with one’s identity. However, these differences were not statistically significant in our analysis. These findings suggest that narrative task framing may help sustain motivation in scientific crowdsourcing, but studies with more participants and different ways of embedding tasks into stories are needed to determine its true effect.
Vi undersøgte, om en fortællingsramme kan motivere frivillige i borgerforskningsprojekter lige så godt eller bedre end klassisk pointbaseret gamification. Opgaven bestod i at markere og mærke affald i fotos (billedsegmentering og annotering). Vi udviklede to versioner af den samme mobile Android-applikation i Unity: én med kun pointbaserede gamification-elementer og én, kaldet JunkCorp, hvor den samme opgave er flettet ind i en historie, og hvor brugerne kan fortsætte med at bidrage efter, at historien er afsluttet. Begge versioner havde rangliste, fremdriftsbjælker og gruppeopgaver for at gøre sammenligningen retfærdig. Vi målte motivation med etablerede spørgeskemaer (User Motivation Inventory og Gameful Experience Questionnaire, GAMEFULQUEST) og med kvalitative interviews. Brugere af JunkCorp-versionen scorede højere på indre motivation samt på identificeret og integreret regulering—former for indre motivation, der bygger på interesse, personlig relevans og overensstemmelse med ens værdier. Forskellene var dog ikke statistisk signifikante i vores analyse. Vores resultater antyder, at fortællingsrammer kan hjælpe med at fastholde motivationen i videnskabelige opgaver, men der er behov for undersøgelser med flere deltagere og forskellige måder at integrere fortællinger på for at fastslå den reelle effekt.
[This apstract has been rewritten with the help of AI based on the project's original abstract]
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