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Digital technology facilitates the lives of visually impaired people. To design accessible technology accepted by the target group, comprehensive methods of user-centred design are needed. In this paper, we present a case study with visually impaired pupils aiming for gaining bottom-up insights to support the ideation and design of a game editor to support orientation and mobility training. We involved relevant stakeholders (pupils, teachers, mobility trainers) using multiple methods, including (contextual) interview, focus group, (ideation) workshop, Gamestorming, digital survey, behavioural observation, self-experience, and early stage prototype testing. With our approach, we were able to gain a rich understanding of the needs of visually impaired pupils. The objective of this paper is to serve as reference for researchers cooperating with visually impaired pupils by providing (1) design implications for a game editor, and (2) a comprehensive reflection on approaches and issues of user-centred design methods with visually impaired pupils.

Orientation and Mobility (O&M) training is an important aspect in the education of visually impaired students. In this work we present a scavenger hunt-like location-based game to support O&M training. In two comparative studies with blind and partially sighted students and interviews with teachers we investigate if a mobile game played in the real world is a suitable approach to support O&M training and if a mobile location-based O&M training game is preferred over a game played in a virtual world. Our results show that a mobile location-based game is a fruitful approach to support O&M training for visually impaired students, and that a mobile location based game is preferred over playing in a virtual world. Based on the gathered insights we discuss implications for using mobile location-based games in O&M training.

It is our great pleasure to welcome you to the UMAP 2017 Fifty Shades of Personalization - Workshop on Personalization in Serious and Persuasive Games and Gameful Interactions. Serious games (games for purposes other than entertainment) as well as persuasive games (games for promoting desirable behavior without coercion) are increasingly adopted by scholars and have also found their way into industry. Elements of games are also increasingly used to design gameful interactions (this is also referred to as gamification). Serious and persuasive approaches focus on imparting knowledge and raising awareness about topics or issues, and also fostering attitude or behavior change in a desirable direction, for example towards a healthier lifestyle. In an era when we are used to highly individualized, personal and ubiquitous interactions and with the possibility to collect an enormous amount of information about people's behaviors, habits and attitudes, personalization has increased much in significance since it became a topic in Human-Computer Interaction. Not only do we have advanced opportunities to personalize serious and persuasive games and gameful interactions, we have also scientific evidence that this is highly useful. Studies show that these technologies are more effective in educating users about certain topics and in supporting them in behavioral and attitudinal change, as well as in raising awareness and engaging them in specific topics, when they are personalized in contrast to employing a one-size-fits-all approach. Although personalization of serious and persuasive games and gameful interactions is a vibrant and highly promising area and has become an important researched field, many aspects of it are still underexplored. Thus, there is common understanding on the importance of personalization itself, but also an ongoing debate and a growing number of research on the approaches used for personalization: Will we use subjective or objective variables for personalization? Will we use continuous (such as traits) or categorical (such as types) dimensions? Will we personalize according to specific interactions (e.g. game dynamics) or ends of the interaction (e.g. different goals)? Will we rely on an a priori personalization or will we be able to personalize in real-time? The various shades of personalization in serious games and gameful interactions will be the central aspect of the workshop and will form the basis for participants' discussions.

Pokemon Go can be considered a successful persuasive game to promote physical activity. This study provides an in-depth analysis of Pokemon Go players’ characteristics that relate to adoption and continued play of the game. Based on online studies at two different points in time (at the initial release and three months later) we analyzed differences in personality traits between players and non-players, as well as between players who continued playing the game and those who stopped playing. The results show that people who played the game score lower in “Conscientiousness” and higher in “Player Motivation” than non-players. Furthermore, people who continued playing the game three months later have a lower score in “Neuroticism” than those who stopped playing. Insights into player characteristics from our empirical analysis of Pokemon Go contribute to answering the key research question regarding to which personality characteristics the persuasive game experience should be personalized.

Player type models -- such as the BrainHex model -- are popular approaches for personalizing digital games towards individual preferences of players. Although several player type models have been developed and are currently used in game design projects, there is still a lack of data on their validity. To close this research gap we currently investigate the psychometric properties (factor structure, reliability, stability) and predictive validity (if player type scores can predict player experience) of the player type model BrainHex in an ongoing project. Results of two online studies (n1=592, n2=243) show that the psychometric properties of the BrainHex model could be improved. We suggest to improve the according questionnaire and sketch how the predictive validity could be investigated in future studies.

Few accessible methods to support brainstorming sessions for blind and visually impaired users exist. We present an approach consisting of a smartphone application and tangible near field communication (NFC) cards enhanced with an additional layer by using different tactile materials. With the smartphone application blind and visually impaired users can write information, like ideas in brainstorming sessions, on NFC cards using speech recognition or voice recording. Text stored on the cards can also be read out loud with the application by using text to speech synthesis. The approach was developed based on a user centered design process with strong participation of blind and visually impaired users. It is low cost, lightweight and easily transportable. Evaluation results show that the approach is fun, easy to use and appreciated by the users. It can be used by blind and visually impaired people for tasks which require spatial arrangement of information, thus supporting accessible brainstorming sessions.

The goal of persuasive games is to change behavior and attitudes in a desirable manner, e.g., to promote physical activity. Research has shown that personalized persuasive approaches are more successful than one-size-fits-all approaches. As a means for personalization, sex has been investigated with results showing that women are overall more persuadable than men. We argue that considering only a dichotomous sex-type categorization may not be able to fully capture the differences in the persuasiveness of persuasion strategies. To that end we apply a dimensional approach of capturing gender identity --- femininity and masculinity. We investigate the relationship between masculinity, femininity, sex and the persuasiveness of ten persuasion strategies in an online study ni?ź=i?ź592. Results show that femininity is significantly associated with seven of the ten strategies, while sex does only show differences for two strategies, suggesting gender identity could be a reliable variable for personalizing persuasive games.

Tracking blockers protect from and inform about hidden trackers and services that collect data in the background while the user is surfing the web. However, existing tracking blockers provide information and feedback visually and thus are barely accessible for visually impaired and blind users. In this paper we present insights about privacy concerns of visually impaired Internet users. Moreover we present feedback strategies and guidelines for an accessible tracking blocker developed in a user centered design process. The underlying feedback principles and guidelines can be used for the design of Privacy Enhancing Technology in other domains, and therefore serve as reference for designers and developers.

One of the trump cards of digital educational games is their enormous intrinsic motivational potential. Although learning game design is often understood on a one-fits-all level, the actual motivational strength of an educational game strongly depends on the individual learners, their very specific goals, preferences, abilities, strength and weakness, personality, and experiences with gaming. Considering motivation being a fragile and constantly changing state, it is important to continuously assess learning and gaming processes and the oscillations of motivation and immersion within a game. With this premise in mind, the authors developed a psycho-pedagogical approach to a non-invasive embedded assessment of motivational states and learning progress, feeding into a dynamic, ontology-driven learner (and gamer) model. To evaluate the approach, the demonstrator games were subject to intensive quantitative and qualitative experimental research. Results show that a meaningful personalization and an individual support are key factors of the success of learning games.

One of the trump cards of digital educational games is their enormous intrinsic motivational potential. Although learning game design is often understood on a one-fits-all level, the actual motivational strength of an educational game strongly depends on the individual learners, their very specific goals, preferences, abilities, strength and weakness, personality, and experiences with gaming. Considering motivation being a fragile and constantly changing state, it is important to continuously assess learning and gaming processes and the oscillations of motivation and immersion within a game. With this premise in mind, the authors developed a psycho-pedagogical approach to a non-invasive embedded assessment of motivational states and learning progress, feeding into a dynamic, ontology-driven learner (and gamer) model. To evaluate the approach, the demonstrator games were subject to intensive quantitative and qualitative experimental research. Results show that a meaningful personalization and an individual support are key factors of the success of learning games.

The paper presents an empirical study with a digital educational game (DEG) called 80Days that aims at teaching geographical content. The goal of the study is twofold: (i) investigating the potential of the eye-tracking approach for evaluating DEG; (ii) studying the issue of vicarious learning in the context of DEG. Twenty-four university students were asked to view the videos of playing two micro-missions of 80Days, which varied with regard to the position of the non-player character (NPC) window (i.e. lower right vs. upper left) and the delivery of cognitive hints (i.e. with vs. without) in this text window. Eye movements of the participants were recorded with an eye-tracker. Learning effect and user experience were measured by questionnaires and interviews. Significant differences between the pre- and post-learning assessment tests suggest that observers can benefit from passive viewing of the recorded gameplay. However, the hypotheses that the game versions with cognitive hints and with the NPC window on the upper left corner can induce stronger visual attention and thus better learning effect are refuted.

Computer games are an incredibly successful technology; due to the dynamic and active nature they are perhaps even more successful and appealing than TV or movies. Facing this success and the significant amount of time young people spend on playing computer games, it is a compelling idea of educators, developers, and researchers to utilize this technology for educational purposes. In this chapter we focus on the emerging technology of digital educational games, we attempt to give a brief summary of the state-of-the-art, and we emphasize leading-edge research in this genre. Moreover, we discuss the psycho-pedagogical foundations of “good” educational computer games. Finally, we provide an outlook to the future of educational technologies.