Academic Paper - A Systematic Literature Review

As rapidly evolving technological applications, games and simulations are already widely integrated in the traditional educational process. They are deployed extensively in the field of education, with an existing body of work examining the relation between games and education (Yang, Chen, & Jeng, 2010; Chiang, Lin, Cheng, & Liu, 2011). In recent years, digital or web-based games have increasingly supported learning. In the context of online education, this research area attracts a significant amount of interest from the scientific and educational community, for example tutors, students and game designers. With the growing expansion of technology, instructors and those who create educational policy are interested in introducing innovative technological tools, such as video games, virtual worlds, and Massive Multi-Player Online Games (MMPOGs) (Buckless, 2014; Gómez, 2014).

Games and simulations show mixed effects across a number of sectors, such as student performance, engagement, and learning motivation. However, as these studies focus only on certain disciplines, there remains a gap in the literature concerning a clear framework of use across academic programmes. As a result, the issue of efficiently integrating games and simulations in the educational process is often up to the instructor’s discretion. Accordingly, the aim of this paper is to develop a framework to allow educators across disciplines to better understand the advantages and draw backs of games and simulations specific to their pedagogical goals.

Rationale of the study

The researchers set out to examine the effectiveness of games and simulations in the learning experience, and immediately encounter the first challenge, which relates to a lack of clear empirical evidence on the issue (Farrington, 2011). The scientific field is too extensive and requires further investigation. Furthermore, there is currently no formal policy framework or guidelines recommended by governments or educational institutions on the adoption of games and simulations in education. This is the case for many countries in Europe, the US, and Australia, where it is the responsibility of the instructor or institution to incorporate games into the curriculum.

A primary aim is to identify studies concentrating on the use of games and simulations for learning purposes, and to analyse the results by comparing them to prior studies’ findings. Two research questions guide the review analysis: a) How can the best practices/methods for designing and incorporating games and simulations in student learning be identified? b) How can games/simulations enhance Higher Education?