How Different Categories of Gamified Stimuli Affect Massive Open Online Courses Continuance Intention and Learning Performance? Mediating Roles of Internal Experiences

Abstract

Drawing on gamification literature, this study develops a research model to examine whether gamification features as environmental stimulus antecedents to learners’ organismic experiences in using massive open online courses (MOOCs) can affect their response on MOOCs and learning outcomes. The proposed research framework, rooted in the stimulus-organism-response model, provides a strong foundation for understanding these hypothesized relationships. Sample data for this study were collected from learners who had experience in taking the gamified MOOCs provided by the MOOC platform launched by a well-known university in Taiwan, and 307 usable questionnaires were analyzed using structural equation modeling. This study verified that three types of gamification features including achievement-related gamification features, immersion-related gamification features, and social interaction-related gamification features positively influenced learners’ internal experiences in using MOOCs (i.e., cognitive involvement, flow experience, and social presence), which jointly expounded their continuance intention of MOOCs, and this in turn enhanced their perceived impact on learning. Overall, this study’s results offered enough evidence to strongly support all of the hypothesized links and the research model. Besides, the results of the mediation analysis confirmed that learners’ internal experiences and continuance intention of MOOCs fully mediated the effects of their perceived gamification features on perceived impact on learning.