Researching Affective Systems and Engaging Interactions
Researchers
Katta Spiel
Visiting Researcher, Participatory Design and Experience
Katta has a background in Cultural Studies and Computer Science from Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. Katta’s PhD centers around experiences of autistic children with technologies and including their first-hand perspectives. Currently, Katta is on a sabbatical from the Social Play Technologies project, in which the research team co-designed technologies with groups of autistic and allistic children. Other research interests include Games and Play, Critical Computer Science, Gender Studies and Philosophy of Science. Katta plays Roller Derby and can be found knitting in most meetings.
Vero Vanden Abeele, Katta Spiel, Lennart E. Nacke, Daniel Johnson, and Kathrin M. Gerling. 2020. Development and validation of the player experience inventory: A scale to measure player experiences at the level of functional and psychosocial consequences. In International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 135. Elsevier. doi:10.1016/j.ijhcs.2019.102370
@article{Abeele2020,
abstract = {Games User Research (GUR) focuses on measuring, analysing and understanding player experiences to optimise game designs. Hence, GUR experts aim to understand how specific game design choices are experienced by players, and how these lead to specific emotional responses. An instrument, providing such actionable insight into player experience, specifically designed by and for GUR was thus far lacking. To address this gap, the Player Experience Inventory (PXI) was developed, drawing on Means-End theory and measuring player experience both at the level of Functional Consequences, (i.e., the immediate experiences as a direct result of game design choices, such as audiovisual appeal or ease-of-control) and at the level of Psychosocial Consequences, (i.e., the second-order emotional experiences, such as immersion or mastery). Initial construct and item development was conducted in two iterations with 64 GUR experts. Next, the scale was validated and evaluated over five studies and populations, totalling 529 participants. Results support the theorized structure of the scale and provide evidence for both discriminant and convergent validity. Results also show that the scale performs well over different sample sizes and studies, supporting configural invariance. Hence, the PXI provides a reliable and theoretically sound tool for researchers to measure player experience and investigate how game design choices are linked to emotional responses.},
author = {Abeele, Vero Vanden and Spiel, Katta and Nacke, Lennart and Johnson, Daniel and Gerling, Kathrin},
doi = {10.1016/j.ijhcs.2019.102370},
issn = {10959300},
journal = {International Journal of Human Computer Studies},
keywords = {GUR,Game experience,Games user research,Means-End theory,Measurement instrument,PX,Player experience,Scale development,Scale validation},
number = {October 2019},
pages = {102370},
publisher = {Elsevier},
title = {{Development and validation of the player experience inventory: A scale to measure player experiences at the level of functional and psychosocial consequences}},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2019.102370},
volume = {135},
year = {2020}
}
Games User Research (GUR) focuses on measuring, analysing and understanding player experiences to optimise game designs. Hence, GUR experts aim to understand how specific game design choices are experienced by players, and how these lead to specific emotional responses. An instrument, providing such actionable insight into player experience, specifically designed by and for GUR was thus far lacking. To address this gap, the Player Experience Inventory (PXI) was developed, drawing on Means-End theory and measuring player experience both at the level of Functional Consequences, (i.e., the immediate experiences as a direct result of game design choices, such as audiovisual appeal or ease-of-control) and at the level of Psychosocial Consequences, (i.e., the secondorder emotional experiences, such as immersion or mastery). Initial construct and item development was conducted in two iterations with 64 GUR experts. Next, the scale was validated and evaluated over five studies and populations, totalling 529 participants. Results support the theorized structure of the scale and provide evidence for both discriminant and convergent validity. Results also show that the scale performs well over different sample sizes and studies, supporting configural invariance. Hence, the PXI provides a reliable and theoretically sound tool for researchers to measure player experience and investigate how game design choices are linked to emotional responses.
Lennart E. Nacke, Pejman Mirza-Babaei, Katta Spiel, Zachary O. Toups, and Katherine Isbister. 2018. Games and Play SIG: Engaging Small Developer Communities. In Extended Abstracts of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI EA '18. Montreal, QC, Canada. ACM, SIG11. doi:10.1145/3170427.3185360
@inproceedings{Nacke:2018:GPS:3170427.3185360,
author = {Nacke, Lennart E. and Mirza-Babaei, Pejman and Spiel, Katta and Toups, Zachary O. and Isbister, Katherine},
title = {Games and Play SIG: Engaging Small Developer Communities},
booktitle = {Extended Abstracts of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems},
series = {CHI EA '18},
year = {2018},
isbn = {978-1-4503-5621-3},
location = {Montreal QC, Canada},
pages = {SIG11:1--SIG11:4},
articleno = {SIG11},
numpages = {4},
url = {http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/3170427.3185360},
doi = {10.1145/3170427.3185360},
acmid = {3185360},
publisher = {ACM},
address = {New York, NY, USA},
keywords = {chi play, entertainment, games, gamification, hci, play, playful experience, video games},
}
The Games-and-Play community has thrived at ACM SIGCHI with a consistent increase in games- and play-related submissions across research papers, workshops, posters, demos, and competitions. The community has attracted a significant number of academic researchers, students, and practitioners to CHI conferences in recent years. CHI 2018 is being held in Montréal, a major game development hub. Montréal is not only a home for major game studios but also more than 100 smaller game studios. In line with the "Engage With CHI" spirit of CHI 2018, this SIG aims to engage the Games and Play community in a discussion about the directions that we can take to advance towards demographics that will benefit from HCI games research but are currently underrepresented: small, independent developers, non-profit organizations, and academics that create mobile games, games for health, games for change, and/or educational games.
