Incorporating gamification into website design to facilitate effective communication

Abstract

Gamification is not simply a temporary trend but would result in huge changes in life, education and marketing. Under the trend, design researchers should focus on the importance of gamification and apply gamification in the improvement of effective communication. This study aims to apply gamification to website design for facilitating effective communication. Two experimental websites, including a gamification incorporated website and a no-gamification incorporated website, are constructed. Users are recruited to use individual websites. After the website experience, task questions, system usability scale, online questionnaire and retrospective thinking aloud are applied to collect user feedback. The data analyses reveal that ‘gamification incorporated website’ could not promote the usability of websites, while learnability, pleasure, engagement and satisfaction are enhanced. Overall speaking, applying gamification to websites could actually enhance communication efficiency. The gamification design guidelines are eventually proposed to assist future designers in constructing meaningful gamification design with communication efficiency.