Ledoux Tracey, Griffith Melissa, Thompson Debbe, Nguyen Nga, Watson Kathy, Baranowski Janice, Buday Richard, Abdelsamad Dina, Baranowski Tom
University of Houston, TX, USA.
Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, USA.
Simul Gaming. 2016 Aug;47(4):490-516. doi: 10.1177/1046878116633331. Epub 2016 Feb 17.
Playing (DIAB) and (NANO) epic video game adventures, increased fruit and vegetable consumption among a multi-ethnic sample of 10-12 year old children during pilot testing. Key elements of both games were educational mini-games embedded in the overall game that promoted knowledge acquisition regarding diet, physical activity and energy balance. 95-100% of participants demonstrated mastery of these mini-games suggesting knowledge acquisition.
This article describes the process of designing and developing the educational mini-games. A secondary purpose was to explore the experience of children while playing the games.
The educational games were based on Social Cognitive and Mastery Learning Theories. A multidisciplinary team of behavioral nutrition, PA, and video game experts designed, developed, and tested the mini-games.
Alpha testing revealed children generally liked the mini-games and found them to be reasonably challenging. Process evaluation data from pilot testing revealed almost all participants completed nearly all educational mini-games in a reasonable amount of time suggesting feasibility of this approach.
Future research should continue to explore the use of video games in educating children to achieve healthy behavior changes.
在初步测试中，让多民族的10至12岁儿童玩（DIAB）和（NANO）两款史诗级电子游戏冒险，增加了他们的水果和蔬菜摄入量。这两款游戏的关键要素是嵌入在整体游戏中的教育小游戏，这些小游戏促进了关于饮食、身体活动和能量平衡的知识获取。95%至100%的参与者展示了对这些小游戏的掌握，表明他们获取了相关知识。
本文描述了教育小游戏的设计和开发过程。第二个目的是探索儿童玩游戏时的体验。
教育游戏基于社会认知和掌握学习理论。一个由行为营养、身体活动和电子游戏专家组成的多学科团队设计、开发并测试了这些小游戏。
阿尔法测试显示，儿童普遍喜欢这些小游戏，并发现它们具有一定的挑战性。初步测试的过程评估数据显示，几乎所有参与者都在合理的时间内完成了几乎所有教育小游戏，表明这种方法具有可行性。
未来的研究应继续探索利用电子游戏来教育儿童以实现健康行为改变。
