Serious Video Games for Health: How Behavioral Science Guided the Development of a Serious Video Game

Debbe Thompson, Tom Baranowski, Richard Buday, Janice Baranowski, Victoria Thompson, Russell Jago and Melissa Juliano Griffith
Additional contact information
Debbe Thompson: USDA/ARS Children's Nutrition Research Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
Tom Baranowski: USDA/ARS Children's Nutrition Research Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
Richard Buday: Archimage, Inc., Houston, Texas, USA
Janice Baranowski: Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
Victoria Thompson: University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, USA
Russell Jago: University of Bristol, UK
Melissa Juliano Griffith: USDA/ARS Children's Nutrition Research Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA

Simulation & Gaming, 2010, vol. 41, issue 4, 587-606

Abstract: Serious video games for health are designed to entertain players while attempting to modify some aspect of their health behavior. Behavior is a complex process influenced by multiple factors, often making it difficult to change. Behavioral science provides insight into factors that influence specific actions that can be used to guide key game design decisions. This article reports how behavioral science guided the design of a serious video game to prevent Type 2 diabetes and obesity among youth, two health problems increasing in prevalence. It demonstrates how video game designers and behavioral scientists can combine their unique talents to create a highly focused serious video game that entertains while promoting behavior change.

Keywords: action-adventure; adolescents; behavioral change; behavioral science; edutainment; ESCAPE FROM DIAB; game design; health behavior; obesity; theory; Type 2 diabetes; video game (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1046878108328087 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:simgam:v:41:y:2010:i:4:p:587-606

DOI: 10.1177/1046878108328087

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Simulation & Gaming
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().