Elisa D. Mekler
Elisa Mekler is a researcher listed at the Center for Cognitive Psychology and Methodology, University of Basel, on her 2017 paper in Computers in Human Behavior. The paper asked whether game elements make people want to do a task, or only make them do more of it.
Who they are
Mekler studies human-computer interaction and the psychology of games. The 2017 paper was written with Brühlmann, Tuch and Opwis.
This page records only what the papers and their published records state. Biography beyond the cited work is not given here.
Key papers
Towards understanding the effects of individual gamification elements on intrinsic motivation and performance (2017), with Brühlmann, Tuch and Opwis. In an online experiment with 273 participants doing an image-tagging task, people worked with points, levels, a leaderboard or none of these. The game elements did not significantly change felt competence or intrinsic motivation, yet levels and the leaderboard in particular produced more tags. The authors concluded that in their study the elements worked as extrinsic incentives, effective for the quantity of work.
Key ideas
The central idea is that more activity is not the same as more motivation. A badge that rewards volume can raise output while leaving interest untouched. Set beside Michael Sailer's 2017 study, the practical lesson for product design is to make game elements report real progress if the aim is lasting engagement.
Sources
- Mekler, E. D., Brühlmann, F., Tuch, A. N., & Opwis, K. (2017). Towards understanding the effects of individual gamification elements on intrinsic motivation and performance. Computers in Human Behavior, 71, 525-534. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2015.08.048