An Examination of Game-Based Learning from Theories of Flow Experience and Cognitive Load

Introduction

In the booming and widely applied computer technology era, computer-assisted learning (CAL) has become popular to enhance students’ learning (Huang, 2011; Wilfried, Jantina, Sanne, & Geert ten, 2011). CAL has certain advantages, such as improving academic results (Dickey, 2011), and enhancing learning attitude (Miller, Chang, Wang, Beier, & Klisch, 2011), but it appears rather attractive in the very beginning, the concentration of students involved in CAL dropped from the start when the frequently use of program increases (Levy, 2007). Therefore, e-learning requires additional assistance for learners continuously proceeding learning (Mayer & Moreno, 2003).

In recent years, computer games has been ubiquitous from media, schools to societies (Căţălina & George, 2012), which present the advantages of inducing intrinsic motivation, enhancing interests, retaining memories, and offering practices, feedbacks, and complex-level thinking (Coller & Scott, 2009; Kebritchi & Hirumi, 2008; Pasin & Giroux, 2011). Moreover, games provide the users for more control ability so that they may pay much concentration and increase the cheerfulness of cognition (Hassan & Poopak, 2012). Consequently, lots of researches considered games are capable of enhancing the flow experience (Massimini & Carli, 1988; Pearce & Ainley, 2005; Jackson & Eklund, 2002). With flow experience, computer games are not simply a recreational entertainment, but could also assist in continuous learning (Fasli & Michalakopoulos, 2006; Kurt et al., 2004, 2008; Shaffer, 2004; Shaffer, et al.) and active learning (Taradi, Taradi, Radic, & Pokrajac, 2005). Moreover, there are a lot of positive appraisals of computer games towards learning. For instance, computer game-based learning combines practice, imaginary, and rules for passing the barriers with repeated operations (Forst, Wortham, & Reifel, 2001). That is, repeated games could deepen the learning effects (Ebner & Holzinger, 2007). Actively participating in learning so is considered as a method to reinforce the learning effects and help the learners to discover more interesting learning approaches beyond traditional textbooks (Embi & Hussain, 2005). In this case, Ang and Radha (2003) considered that learning through games could enhance enjoyment which was becoming a favorable method towards learning. Therefore, this study aimed to apply game-based learning with the combination of games and e-learning to enhance the flow experience in learning and solve the perplexities of concentration shortage and high drop-out rate in e-learning. Nevertheless, whether the combination of games and learning would result in cognitive overload is regarded as a critical problem (Kerres, Bormann, & Vervenne, 2009). Besides, it’s less discussed if flow experience and cognitive load resulted from game-based learning which could reduce the learning intention similar to the repeated using of general e-learning systems. For this reason, the self-designed computer game system is utilized as the experimental tool, and the subjects are divided into computer game group, game-based learning group, and computer-assisted learning group to discuss whether the comprehension of computer games in learning would enhance and achieve the same flow experience in computer games or appear extreme effects on cognitive load. The change of game-based learning in flow experience and cognitive load are further analyzed when repeatedly using the game-based learning system.