Attentional Bias Modification With Serious Game Elements: Evaluating the Shots Game.

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Behavioral Science
• Addiction Research

Background:

• Young adults frequently engage in heavy alcohol use, increasing risks for health problems and addiction.
• Cognitive bias modification of attention (CBM-A) shows promise in clinical settings for relapse prevention by retraining attentional processes.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if integrating serious game elements into CBM-A training can enhance motivation in young adults.
• To explore a novel approach to prevent the escalation of regular alcohol use into problematic patterns.

Main Methods:

• 96 heavy-drinking undergraduate students participated in 4 training sessions.
• Conditions included regular CBM-A, a gamified version ('Shots'), and a placebo.
• Measures assessed motivation, drinking behavior, and attentional bias for alcohol pre- and post-training.

Main Results:

• Only regular CBM-A training reduced alcohol attentional bias; self-reported drinking behavior remained unaffected.
• Motivation to train decreased across all conditions, indicating gamification did not fully counteract task tedium.
• The gamified condition showed slightly greater motivational declines, suggesting potential negative impacts of unmet gamification expectations.

Conclusions:

• Gamification in training carries risks; motivational value must meet or exceed expectations.
• Disappointing gamification can have detrimental effects on adolescent motivation.
• Caution and thorough scientific evaluation are advised when implementing gamification strategies.