Recommendations for implementing gamification for mental health and wellbeing
Open accessAbstract
Gamification is increasingly being proposed as a strategy to increase engagement for mental health and wellbeing technologies. However, its implementation has been criticized as atheoretical, particularly in relation to behavior change theory and game studies theories. Definitions of the term "gamification" vary, sometimes widely, between and within academic fields and the effectiveness of gamification is yet to be empirically established. Despite this, enthusiasm for developing gamified mental health technologies, such as interventions, continues to grow. There is a need to examine how best to implement gamification in mental health and wellbeing technologies in a way that takes quick production cycles into account while still emphasizing empirical investigation and building a rigorous evidence base. With reference to game studies and the medical (eHealth/mHealth) literature, this article interrogates gamification for mental health and wellbeing by examining core properties of the game form. It then explores how gamification can best be conceptualized and implemented for mental health and wellbeing goals from conceptualization through to iterative co-development and evaluation that accommodates software development schedules. Finally, it summarizes its conceptual analysis into recommendations for researchers and designers looking to do so. These recommendations are: (1) assess suitability, (2) implement to support, (3) assess acceptability, (4) evaluate impact, and (5) document comprehensively. These recommendations aim to encourage clear language, unified terminology, the application and evaluation of theory, comprehensive and constant documentation, and transparent evaluation of outcomes.
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The web app provides limited opportunities to create interactive elements, such as gamification.
“However, the web app provides limited opportunities to create interactive elements, such as gamification (59).”
From Improving mental well-being in psychocardiology—a feasibility trial for a non-blended web application as a brief metacognitive-based intervention in cardiovascular disease patients (2023) · cites this paper as [59]
The Introduction discusses gamification in digital and web-based mental-health interventions, and ‘The Supportive Role of Gamification’ discusses design choices. Neither section addresses whether the citing authors’ web app has limited opportunities to create interactive elements. Searches for web-app limitations and interactivity found no passage supporting that specific claim. (LLM, conf=0.75)
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An Escape Game on University Students’ Mental Health During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Cocreation Study
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Gamification in Retail: Enhancing Grocery Customer Experience with Location-Based Strategies
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Gamification Applied to Autism Spectrum Disorder
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MeetingBenji: Tackling Cynophobia with Virtual Reality, Gamification, and Biofeedback
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Designing VR Music Game for Stress Reduction
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Mental Health | Atmospheres | Video Games
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EDUCATIONAL APPLICATION -ASSISTED BOARD GAME FOR PSYCHOLOGICAL FIRST AID LEARNING AMONG PRE-CADETS
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- Authors
- Cheng, V. W. S.
- Affiliations
- The University of Sydney (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Cheng, Vanessa Wan Sze
- Venue
- Frontiers in Psychology
- Publisher
- Frontiers Media SA
- Published
- 2020-12-07
- Volume
- 11
- Pages
- 586379-586379
- ISSN
- 1664-1078 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC7750532
- OpenAlex
- W3111987006
- Cited by
- 74
- References
- 90
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 17 · 2024: 21 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 7
- FWCI
- 1.37
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Frontiers in Psychology (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- Movember Foundation
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Educational Games and Gamification
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Digital Mental Health Interventions
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Innovative Human-Technology Interaction
- Keywords
- gamification, mental health, well-being, gamified interventions, behaviour change theory, game studies, e-health, mobile health, user engagement, co-development, implementation guidelines, terminology
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