Gamification After Almost a Decade: Is it Still Relevant? A Case of Non-STEM Hybrid E-learning University Course

Abstract

Gamification is a common and familiar term so far and it can be seen in almost every part of human activity. It's been nine years since the terminology first appeared in Gartner's Hype Cycle Report in 2011, however, higher education institutions still do not apply computer game elements to online Learning Management Systems (LMS). The problems encountered are related either to the administrators of the LMS system or to teachers who, for various reasons (lack of time, authority, knowledge, motivation, etc.,) reject the changes. Objective of this paper is to determent if there is statistical significant difference between experimental and control groups. Experimental group will be using gamified Moodle online course while control will use classical Moodle online course. Research is made on a sample of 46 graduate students from the Faculty of Organization and Informatics within the course Computer Mediated Communication. Experiment lasted for 14 days after which testing the students' motivation to use the teaching materials as well as the lessons learned after the experimental period took place. The results indicate 7 times higher activity in the experimental group of students, as well as 33.23% better results (using t-test) in the experimental group of students in the final knowledge test, thus accepting both hypotheses of this research.