Online students: use this version instead.

A group of venture capitalists has decided to fund the creation of a new company to create educational software for the home and school market. They've hired some of the leading researchers/thinkers in the field of motivation to advise them, and now they're getting ready to hire a fleet of instructional designers.

The goal: as quickly as possible, you need to become credible and facile at looking at software and describing it in terms of motivation constructs. Toward that end, you'll work in teams of four to divide and conquer your uncertainties on the topic.

You'll need to have access to the course readings on intrinsic motivation to complete this exercise.

To begin, we'll count off to assign roles and teams. Instead of counting numerically, we'll count off as Mike1, Mark1, John1, Hugh1, Mike2, Mark2, John2, Hugh2, etc.. Once you know who you are, your task is as follows:

Mikes: you are to become Csikszentmihalyologists. Scan and dissect the Csikszentmihalyi readings until they flow into your long term memory.

Marks: I'm a Lepper, he's a Lepper, wouldn't you like to be a Lepper, too? Drink Dr. Lepper's article deeply and prepare to speak and think as he does.

Johns: Declare John Keller as your personal guru and squeeze what you can from his chapter.

Hughs: You're the playboy (or -girl). You'll going to be a game player for the next few minutes (tough job!). You need to pay attention to how you feel as you play and be able to report to the others. You don't need to speak in motivational terms... just tell it like it is.

  1. The first thing we'll do is to become familiar with a method for measuring emotional state. We'll walk through the use of the Game Response Adjective Matrix as a whole class.

  2. The Hugh for each team should now download the game that has been assigned to your team, and begin to get acquainted with it.


    If for some reason there is a problem downloading any of these games, here is a backup possibility:

    While the Hughes are doing that, the Mikes, Marks and Johns will get together to plan their analysis. Each of you should take a blank sheet of paper and write down the numbers 0, 2, 4... up to 30 in the left margin, skipping a line in between each. This will provide you with a place to jot down your observations at 2 minute intervals. Ask yourselves (and share with the others) what kinds of things you'll be looking for on the screen and on your learner's face from each of your theoretical perspectives.

      Time spent so far:

  3. Every 2 minutes (I will be the timekeeper for the whole class) the Mikes are to ask the Hughs about their feelings by asking them to point to the adjective (or two) that most closely describes how they feel. The Hugh can elaborate by explaining how they feel if they like. All three non-players, will record the adjective answered on a sheet of paper next to the elapsed time. Also note what's going on in the game at that moment (what's on the screen, the player's score or status, etc.)
  4. Repeat the questioning process every 2 minutes for the next 20-30 minutes. If at the 20 minute mark the player is in the middle of a game, continue until the game is completed. If a game is concluded well before the 20 minute mark, continue playing until a natural break point is arrived at.
  5. At the end of the time period, ask the Hugh to go over each data point and reflect on what s/he was thinking and feeling at that moment.
  6. Finally, discuss the results from the perspectives of Czikszentmihalyi, Keller and Lepper and type in your summary onto this page. Describe any overall patterns in motivation and emotion that you noted. What quadrant of the Game Response Adjective Matrix did they spend most time in? How did it vary over time? What would each theorist have to say about it?


Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. New York: Harper & Row. (Chapter 3: Enjoyment and the quality of life; Chapter 4: The conditions of flow)

Keller, J. M., & Suzuki, K. (1988). Use of the ARCS motivation model in courseware design. In D. H. Jonassen (Ed.). Instructional designs for microcomputer courseware. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Lepper, M. R., & Malone, T. W. (1987). Intrinsic motivation and instructional effectiveness in computer-based education. In R. E. Snow & M. J. Farr (Eds.). Aptitude, learning and instruction. Volume 3: Conative and affective process analysis. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Malone, T. W., & Lepper, M. R. (1987). Making learning fun: A taxonomy of intrinsic motivations for learning. In R. E. Snow & M. J. Farr (Eds.). Aptitude, learning and instruction. Volume 3: Conative and affective process analysis. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Russell, J. A., Weiss, A., & Mendelsohn, G. A. (1989). Affect grid: A single-item scale of pleasure and arousal. Journal of personality and social psychology, 57, 493-502.

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