DESCRIPTION
The basics of sustained engagement and the reasons for disengaging from something are crucial to understand basic human behaviour and design interventions. However little is known so far about what makes it difficult or easy to disengage from particularly engaging tasks. In this research project we will specifically look at situations where sustained engagement is proven to occur: grand strategy games. Games like Europa Universalis IV have players typically engage with them for hundreds, if not thousands, of hours. What makes these games so appealing? Is this draw audience specific or not? What can we learn from this for other situations where sustained engagement is necessary to achieve behaviour change (e.g., an intervention designed to reintegrate offenders into society). Even though these games are highly played and people are motivated to play, they also need to disengage from them (e.g., because they need eat or have real-world appointments); is there something to be learned about what makes it easy or hard to disengage and also reengage with the game? Can these lessons potentially be transferred to other situations?
Keywords
Disengagement, Video Games, Addiction, Behaviour Change
Research question
Exact research questions will be determined based on student interests after discussion. Potential research questions are e.g., (1) what are the reasons for people to come back and play a specific game and engage with it for a long time? (2) does the motivation shift over time for games that people played many times? (3) what game mechanics support engagement and disengagement? (4) what makes it easy or difficult for people to disengage from the game?
TYPE OF Research
Mixed Methods research: depending on the design the ratio of qualitative to quantitative data may shift. Most likely online data collection possible.
DATA-ANALySIS
The quantitative data of this study will be analysed by quantitative data analysis programmes such as R. The qualitative data will be analysed using Atlas.ti
INFORMATION
Please contact Lynn Weiher (l.weiher@utwente.nl) when you are interested in this assignment. The assignment is open to 2 students.
Literature
- Alexandrovsky, D., Gerling, K., Opp, M. S., Hahn, C. B., Birk, M. V., & Alsheail, M. (2024). Disengagement from games: Characterizing the experience and process of exiting play sessions. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 8(CHI PLAY), 1-27.
- Nakamura, Y., Takao, R., Fukushima, S., & Arakawa, Y. (2025). Ethical Disengagement in Mobile Games: The Effects of Loading Delay and Grayscale on User Engagement. Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies, 9(1), 1-21.
- O'Brien, H. L., Roll, I., Kampen, A., & Davoudi, N. (2022). Rethinking (Dis) engagement in human-computer interaction. Computers in human behavior, 128, 107109.
- Doan, V. A., Alexandrovsky, D., van Sintemaartensdijk, I., Gerling, K., & Friehs, M. A. (2025). Pixels and people: Exploring the dynamics of engagement and disengagement in Minecraft's multiplayer realm. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 198, 103465.
- Gilbert, A., Schöne, F., Kreling, R., Dietrich, F., & Reinecke, L. (2025, September). 101 reasons to stop: A systematic review of media cues for disengagement. In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference of the ACM Greek SIGCHI Chapter (pp. 17-26).
- Alexandrovsky, D., Friehs, M. A., Birk, M. V., Yates, R. K., & Mandryk, R. L. (2019, October). Game dynamics that support snacking, not feasting. In Proceedings of the Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play (pp. 573-588).
- Alexandrovsky, D., Friehs, M. A., Grittner, J., Putze, S., Birk, M. V., Malaka, R., & Mandryk, R. L. (2021, May). Serious snacking: A survival analysis of how snacking mechanics affect attrition in a mobile serious game. In Proceedings of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1-18).