What are the 3 main social sciences and humanities on which gamification is based?
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The human and social sciences are a set of academic disciplines that study various aspects of the world and human reality. They broadly study how people interact with one another, behave and develop into cultures, and spread across and influence the larger world.
In a gamification context, social science research can be applied to understand how players interact with games and reward systems. Understanding how players, users, or customers behave in a game journey helps companies create better gamification experiences that are more appropriately tailored to meet business requirements.
What is gamification?
Gamification is a process of tapping into user psychology to make something boring or routine more fun and playful. Essentially, it’s finding a way to make something into a game, or applying game mechanics to a real world process to get better results. Better results are achieved through better engagement, which occurs in gamified experiences because the innate human desire to play and have fun is appeased, and people’s competitiveness and hunger for discovery are appealed to.
Gamification can be applied to any situation where improvement and innovation depends on greater engagement levels. In other words: everything. Learning a new language? That’s been gamified. Learning to code? That’s been gamified too. Keep moving and progressing on your fitness goals? There are so many gamified apps and full blown exergames at this point, it’s almost old news. However, as technologies advance and become more accessible, more areas can be gamified in new and innovative ways.
The possibilities inherent in mobilising positive user emotions and redirecting them towards desired behaviours and outcomes are only just being realised. Our understanding of the social sciences and the humanities are foundations upon which we can better understand human interactions, and advance the techniques and effectiveness of gamification.
What are the humanities and social sciences?
As their names suggest, these fields are divided into two categories: the social sciences and the humanities. The humanities and social sciences aim to understand human interactions and the social factors that influence them: how people think, feel, and behave in their environment.
Social sciences include, but are not limited to, economics, political science, sociology, anthropology, psychology, and law. The humanities include history, language, literature, philosophy, and the arts. There are also intermediate fields such as the natural sciences, which focus on the study of nature and its processes, such as chemistry, physics and biology.
What is the use of social sciences and humanities in a gamified context?
Gamification is often used for education and training, in marketing and sales campaigns, and in the development of corporate culture and processes. Essentially all areas involving human behaviour, and human interactions, variables that are the focus of study for social sciences and the humanities.
The purpose of using social sciences and humanities in gamification is to ensure that we understand how people think and behave, and how they interact with each other to meet their needs. We want to know how people learn, how they react to certain situations, to different systems, how they solve problems, and what the keys are to fostering effective collaborations. These have formed the primary aims of gamified experiences for some time, and gaining a better understanding of them through study can contribute to the furthering of gamification as a practice, in tandem with the advancing technologies that support modern gamification.
The three main branches and disciplines of the humanities and social sciences on which gamification is based are:
Sociology
Sociologists study how people interact with each other and with society in general. They examine the social aspect and the interactions between individuals, groups, organisations, institutions, and societies. They then analyse these relationships and try to understand their causes.
Psychology
Psychologists study the mental health, mind, and behaviour of humans. They examine how people think, feel, learn, remember, sleep, dream, and make decisions.
Anthropology
At the junction of the humanities and the social sciences, anthropologists study humans in all their aspects, both cultural and physical, past and present.
Social sciences and humanities academics analyse data collected through polls, surveys, studies, and interviews to make predictions about socio-cultural trends in a specific area or group of people. This can provide essential information for making decisions about human society and its management, its future history, communities, and developing behaviours.
The continued study of these areas is essential from the point of view of people developing and creating gamified projects. This research makes it possible to be more effective at engaging your target audience by being better able to satisfy their needs and expectations.
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