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What is Serious Games

Handbook of Research on ICTs for Human-Centered Healthcare and Social Care Services
Electronic games whose main purpose is “serious” and not to simply entertain. The primary “serious” purposes can be to teach or train in areas such as education, health care, advertising, politics, etc.
Published in Chapter:
Playing for Better or for Worse?: Health and Social Outcomes with Electronic Gaming
Patrícia Arriaga (ISCTE-Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, Cis-IUL, Portugal), Francisco Esteves (Mid Sweden University, Sweden & Cis-IUL, Portugal), and Sara Fernandes (ISCTE-Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, Cis-IUL, Portugal)
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-4666-3986-7.ch003
Abstract
Of the many of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) products, electronic games are considered as having great potential for improving health and social outcomes. This chapter considers the factors that may be involved in facilitating health and social outcomes and also those factors that might be considered risk factors by reviewing studies that have shown both positive and detrimental effects on people’s physical and mental health. The authors also debate some research questions that remain unanswered and suggest guidelines for practitioners, researchers, and game designers.
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Fidelity and Play Model: Balancing Seriousness
Games that use its elements of motivation, engagement, and fun for teaching, learning, training, or positive behavior change.
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Exploring Educational Video Game Design: Meaning Potentials and Implications for Learning
The intention of such games is that they be used for more than entertainment. They are often used in education and semiformal educational settings.
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Using Video Gameplay to Measure Achievement for Students with Disabilities: A New Perspective to Grading and Achievement Reporting
Digital games, simulations, virtual environments and mixed reality/media that provide opportunities to educate or train through responsive narrative/story, gameplay or encounters.
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An Interactive Escape Room That Increases the Digital Skills of the Physical Activity and Sport Science Students
Any system that is a game and whose primary purpose is not fun, although it should always be implied. They have been designed for a specific purpose and are designed specifically for that purpose.
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The Interplay Between In-Game Activity, Learning Gains, and Enjoyment in a Serious Game on STEM
These are games that have as main purpose one beyond entertainment, for example learning, training a user to change their habits, or health rehabilitation.
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Gamification in Healthcare Education: Demystifying a Trend
Game designed for an educational purpose, making allow the training of the decision-making and interventions of a real-life case, in such a way as to solve the problems found, so that its ending is not just to be entertainment.
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Game4Manager: More Than Virtual Managers
Is built with pedagogical principles and education and training purposes, supported by gaming techniques and entertainment.
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Playful Education and Innovative Gamified Learning Approaches
Initially, serious games where considered to be games with a purpose. The basic idea behind serious games is to hide important and time-consuming tasks behind a gaming veil. They can be applied in societal studies, in crowdsourcing projects and any setting under which the players are actually contributors to a cause that is hidden behind the game.
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Transforming Mathematics Teaching through Games and Inquiry
Also frequently called educational games or our preferred term, transformational games , games designed to change learner’s knowledge, understanding or behavior.
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Graceful Ageing: Exergaming as a Means to Delay Mental and Physical Decline among the Elderly
Games developed for purposes beyond mere entertainment. Serious games are considered useful to those who wish to use simulation for training and education e.g., flight simulations, exploit entertainment as motivation e.g. to perform physical and mental exercise (see exergaming).
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Reinventing Progressive Learning and Teaching Processes Through Gamification
Aa serious game is a game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment.
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Increasing Engagement Through Explicit and Implicit Gamification in Higher Education
Games created for a specific purpose of learning and teaching, often in the form or training simulators.
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Gaming Ethics, Rules, Etiquette, and Learning
A classification referring to games that are specifically designed for a particular purpose. These games are often for education, training, and advertising, and are more often used in particular industries like health care and the military.
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A Systematic Review of Video Games for Second Language Acquisition
Video games that were designed to achieve certain learning results.
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A Rationale for Leveraging Serious Game Design Through Sociocultural Theory
Serious Games are games whose primary objective is not related to entertainment. Typically, such games aim to foster the learning of concepts, skills, and attitudes in various disciplines. While Serious Games are not mainly focused on entertainment, they certainly do not exclude it.
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Interactive Virtual Participation for Opera and Theatre Using New Digitization Information Systems
Are games designed for educational purposes, not primarily based on entertainment, but based on dynamic and fun education.
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Adopting a Role-Model, Game-Based Pedagogical Approach to Gender Equality in STEAM: The FemSTEAM Mysteries Digital Game
Complex digital games whose entertainment quality is used for educational, training, and/or communication purposes.
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Flow, Motivation, Social Interaction, and Design Issues of Serious Games in Education
Serious games are digital games aiming to improve players’ skills or to provide them with knowledge while also being entertaining.
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Using Game Development to Teach Programming
A game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment, for example, for education.
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Developing a Serious Game for Police Training
Use gaming technology for purposes that go beyond pure entertainment.
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Serious Games Advancing the Technology of Engaging Information
An umbrella term referring to any game developed for a non-entertainment based purpose.
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A Guide to Integrating COTS Games into Your Classroom
Games designed for purposes other than entertainment, according to Serious Games founder Ben Sawyer (personal communication, Serious Games ListServ). Distinguished from COTS because these are not purely for entertainment, and from edutainment because the learning is much more tightly integrated with the game environments than traditional edutainment titles.
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Game Mechanics Supporting a Learning and Playful Experience in Educational Escape Games
Educational games that are created in the context of game-based learning aiming to support the learners’ achievement of specific learning outcomes.
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Governmentality, Playbor, and Peak Performance: Critiques and Concerns of Health and Wellness Gamification
A specific type of video games that are designed with a very specific purpose in mind, usually associated with academic or cultural lessons.
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Serious Games, Meditation, Brain-Computer Interfacing, and Virtual Reality (VR): Empowering Players to Discover Their Minds
They are games that have scope beyond recreation. They can be for training, teaching and propagating information, in fact games create uniquely customizable environments that excel in all of these areas.
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An Overview on the Use of Serious Games in the Military Industry and Health
- Serious Games are applications of interactive technology that extend far beyond the traditional videogame market, including: training, military exploration, analytics, visualization, simulation, education, health and therapy.
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Spinning off Gerotechnology Business Activities: The LLM Care Best Practice Paradigm
Electronic games that have entertainment only as an incidental objective. Usually refers to software and hardware solutions that utilize game design principles in order to motivate the user towards a productive real life activity.
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Virtual Reality for Fire Safety Engineering
A game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment.
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Gamification
A game-based environment where the primary intention is not the entertainment of the player, but the attainment of some other objective which may be related to investigation or players’ progress towards an objective of some real-world importance.
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(Self-) Educational Effects of Computer Gaming Cultures
The idea of using games or game technologies for “serious”, e.g., educational purposes is as old as the idea of “learning games”, but is not limited to those forms. As opposed to games designed for entertainment, serious games can be defined as computer games aiming towards an underlying second “off-game” goal that differs from in-game goals such as finishing a level or gaining high scores. Beyond the surface of gaming actions—or embedded into those—, serious games try to evoke learning processes or even complex experiences (e.g., through taking the perspective of political refugees, trying to bring them out of a danger zone). Computer game art can be seen as a related form of serious games, aiming, for example, towards open aesthetical experiences rather than following didactic concepts and defined learning goals.
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Review of Serious Games for People with Diabetes
Are games designed for a primary purpose other than entertainment. They involve the use of electronic games technologies and methodologies and are meant to take on real-world problems. Entertainment and fun are usually used in such games to achieve the desired progress and/or learning by the player.
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Serious Games in Speech Therapy
Games designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment. The adjective “serious” refers to the products used in industry, education, scientific research, medicine, architecture, engineering, politics, etc.
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Serious Games in Entrepreneurship Education
A game designed for any purpose rather than entertainment.
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Gamification: Applications for Health Promotion and Health Information Technology Engagement
Are simulations or virtual environments which are designed and processed for problem solving (e.g., military, flight, education, health and driving simulations).
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Digital Storyworlds: Transformative Ways to Play
Games designed for a primary goal different from pure entertainment, may be produced by the video game industry, with connection to the acquisition of knowledge.
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Leadership Learning through Virtual Play
A genre of digital games that have been designed specifically for the purpose of learning and teaching has arisen and such games are oftentimes referred to as ‘seriousgames. Serious games combine learning strategies, knowledge and structures, and game elements to teach specific skills, knowledge and attitudes important in a particular discipline.
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Interdisciplinary Communication: Paving the Way for Gamification in Entrepreneurship Education – A Case Study From a Medium-Sized UK University
Games which are considered “serious”, which can include both physical as well as digital games, of which the purpose is to educate and train rather than merely to entertain.
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Instructor-Related Factors Affecting Game Utilization in Software Engineering Education: A Replication Study
Games that engage the user and contribute to the achievement of a defined purpose other than pure entertainment (irrespective of if the user is consciously aware of this).
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Towards an HCI-Based Symbiotic Environment for Alzheimer's Support
A game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment. The ‘serious’ adjective is generally prepended to refer to products used by industries like defense, education, scientific exploration, health care, emergency management, city planning, engineering, religion, and politics.
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Digital Games for Diagnostic Assessment of Cognitive Skills and Competences: Literature Review and Framework
Games that are not designed simply for entertainment or fun, but also for teaching, assessing, and modifying behaviors.
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Game-Based Historical Learning
Related terms are game-based learning, edutainment, and eduventures.The “Indiana Jones” dilemma: popular media such as Indiana Jones and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider have popularized archaeology, but they are actually violent action films and do not promote careful and deferential approaches to archaeological relics and heritage sites. This raises a dilemma: how should archaeology best make use of this popularization while distancing themselves from the vandalism, sensationalism, violence, and shoddy scholarship?
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COTS Computer Game Effectiveness
Games used for training, advertising, simulation, or education that are designed to run on personal computers or video game consoles. These games are not only entertaining, but have some kind of learning value associated with them.
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Designing Engaging Educational Games and Assessing Engagement in Game-Based Learning
Serious games are defined as not having entertainment, enjoyment or fun as their primary purpose.
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Gamifying Cultural Heritage. Education, Tourism Development, and Territory Promotion: Two Italian Examples
Games that have an explicit and carefully thought-out educational purposes and are not intended to be played primarily for amusement. However, this does not mean that serious games are not, or should not be, entertaining.
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Gaming in Adult Education
Games designed for a primary purpose other than entertainment.
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Playfulness and Seriousness: The Power of Video Games to Teach and Enhance Cultural Intelligence (CQ)
Games designed for purposes other than fun and entertainment, with a specific aim to educate.
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A Case Study of Developing Educator Digital Competences With Serious Game Design
Games designed with a primary focus on education, training, or other serious purposes, while still incorporating game-like elements.
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Mobile Games and Learning
An initiative whereby video games are targeted outside of entertainment to include education, training, health, and public policy ( Serious Games Initiative, n.d. ).
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The Role of Serious Games in Healthcare and Its Contribution to the Healthcare Ecosystem: Serious Games vs. Wearables
Are games designed especially for clinical populations, and they promote comprehensive and professional therapeutic models as game therapies.
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A Gamified Approach to Enhance Environmental Sustainability Awareness and Responsibility
Games designed with a primary purpose other than pure entertainment, often used for educational, training, or awareness-raising purposes.
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Visualization: Future Technology and Practices for Computational Science and Engineering
A game designed for any purpose rather than entertainment. Serious games are considered useful to those who wish to use simulation for training and education e.g., flight simulations. They also make use of games engines, a good platform for development and play.
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Virtual Reality Interventions to Improve Function After Stroke
Games where the primary objective is not the entertainment, but rather with the aim of creating important challenges for rehabilitation.
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Cyberloafing and Constructive Recreation
Games that are directly developed for the purpose of enhancing some aspect of educational, political, social, or workplace interaction. Serious games can serve to deepen the players’ understandings of some dimensions of the human experience, often providing the capability to experiment with and explore in depth different aspects of social and interpersonal interaction.
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The Role of Gamification in Neurocognitive Rehabilitation
Games with another purposes besides entertainment, that can be used to promote learning or behavioral changes.
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Technology and Mental Health
Games developed for purposes other than mere entertainment.
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Management of Dementia Symptoms in Healthcare: An Evaluation of the Non-Pharmacological Approaches in Cognitive Symptom Management
Are interactive and educational games designed for specific groups of individuals, for example, people with dementia, and aim to cognitively rehabilitate, train and stimulate the brain, improve behaviour, mood and social ability.
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The Use of Mobile Learning Technologies in Primary Education
Serious games refer to games that are used in industries like; education, health care, engineering, urban planning, politics and defense, among other areas. Such games are usually designed for training purpose other than pure entertainment.
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The Serious Games Applied for Health
A physical and mental contest, played with digital tools involving story, art and software, where goals go beyond fun. They serve to teach, train, inform, memorize, develop skills and all aspects of education.
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Serious Games and the Technology of Engaging Information
An umbrella term referring to any game developed for a non-entertainment based purpose.
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Advancing Health Literacy in the Technological Era: The Role of Serious Games in Promoting Body Awareness Among Older Adults
Games designed with a specific purpose beyond entertainment, often for educational, therapeutic, or specific population-based objectives.
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Math Teacher Perceptions About Gamification Strategies: An Exploratory Study in the Spanish Context
Complete games-based experiences that aim at providing users with training and practice in simulated real-world situations and with the use of real-world objects.
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Using Serious Games for Training and Development of Human Resources
Games that are developed using video game technologies for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment.
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Digital Technologies in Dementia Care
Games that are developed for a purpose beyond entertainment, such as training or education.
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Simulation, Games, and Virtual Environments in IT Education
Games used for serious training or analysis as opposed to entertainment.
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The Design, Play, and Experience Framework
Games that serve a purpose beyond just entertainment, such as education or training.
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Improving Emergency Management Training Within Organizations: TiER-Tool – A Serious Game
Serious games are games designed with an educational purpose rather than for entertainment purposes.
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Gamification for Technology-Enhanced Language Teaching and Learning
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Towards the Development of a Game for Computational Thinking: Identifying Students' Needs and Interests
Serious games are games in which their primary goal is to study or practice a skill rather than to have fun.
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Cyberloafing and Constructive Recreation
Games that are directly developed for the purpose of enhancing some aspect of educational, political, social, or workplace interaction. Serious games can serve to deepen the players’ understandings of some dimensions of the human experience, often providing the capability to experiment with and explore in depth different aspects of social and interpersonal interaction.
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Digital Propensity: An Investigation of Video Game and Information and Communication Technology Practices
An initiative whereby video games are targeted outside of entertainment to include education, training, health, and public policy (Serious Games Initiative, 2006).
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Foreign Languages Learning: From the E-Book to iTV-Assisted Learning
Computer games designed for a purpose beyond pure entertainment. They use the motivation levers of game design and game media to enhance the motivation of participants to engage in complex or boring tasks. Serious games are therefore used in a variety of professional situations such as education, training, and assessment.
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A Systematic Review of Serious Games for Health Education: Technology, Challenges, and Future Directions
Digital interactive applications with a primary purpose beyond mere entertainment. These games are designed to educate, train, or influence behavior by combining engaging gameplay with educational or training objectives.
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Practical Applications of Serious Games in Education
Commercial and non commercial games and digital applications which utilise game design principles for educational and instructional purposes.
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The Role of Serious Games in Shaping Pro-Environmental Behaviours: Changing Attitudes Toward Renewable Energy
Full-fledged games that are used for a main purpose other than entertainment, such as educational learning or behaviour change.
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Context-Free Educational Games: Open-Source and Flexible
Also known as “simulations”, they are edutainment applications that deploy interactive, 3D game technology to provide content that simulates real world scenarios and produces learning outcomes. Serious games allow learners to experience situations that are impossible in the real world for reasons of safety, cost, and time (physician surgical techniques and airline pilot maneuvers).
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An Overview of Serious Games in Cognitive Rehabilitation
Games which the main purpose is not the entertainment, but instead, promote learning and behavior changes in various areas, such business, industry, marketing, education and healthcare; they are designed to solve problems in several areas and involve challenges and rewards, using the entertainment and engagement components provided when user is playing games.
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Money Management: Serious Games for the Elderly
Serious games created for the purpose of non-entertainment, although they may be included.
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Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Play Games for Learning
Games that integrate gaming elements with learning or training objectives. The name also refers to a movement of researchers and developers who are working towards developing games specifically aimed at educational audiences.
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Examining Motivational Game Features for Students With Learning Disabilities or Attention Disorders
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