Do all users equally enjoy all game elements in gamification? This talk presents the Hexad user types survey and the game elements correlated with each one of the six Hexad user types. Presented at the ACM CHI PLAY 2016 Conference.

1. The Gamification User
Types Hexad Scale
Gustavo F. Tondello, Rina R. Wehbe,
Lisa Diamond, Marc Busch,
Andrzej Marczewski, Lennart E. Nacke

2. Gamification
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Game design elements in non-game contexts (Deterding et al., 2011)
(Marczewski, 2015)
Deterding, Dixon, Khaled, & Nacke. 2011. From Game Design Elements to Gamefulness: Defining “Gamification.” Proc. of MindTrek '11, ACM.
Andrzej Marczewski. 2015. 48 Gamification elements, mechanics and ideas. Gamified UK.

3. Self-determination Theory
Autonomy
Competence
Relatedness
Meaning
Internalization
and Integration
Extrinsic
Motivation
Intrinsic
Motivation
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(Ryan & Deci, 2000)
R. Ryan & E. Deci. 2000. Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being.
The American Psychologist 55, 1: 68–78.

4. Gamification User Types Hexad
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(Marczewski, 2015)
Do all users equally enjoy all game elements?
Theoretical References
• Self-determination theory
(Ryan & Deci, 2000)
• Player typologies
(Bartle, 2005)
Andrzej Marczewski. 2015. User Types. In Even Ninja Monkeys Like to Play: Gamification, Game Thinking & Motivational Design. Gamified UK.
R. Ryan & E. Deci. 2000. Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being.
The American Psychologist 55, 1: 68–78.
Richard Bartle. 2005. Virtual Worlds: Why People Play. Massively Multiplayer Game Development 2, 1.

5. Goals
Gap: no validated instrument for assessing user types
Goal: Propose and validate a survey measure for scoring
an individual in the six Hexad user types
Gap: no empirical evidence that the user types explain user’s
preferences for different game elements
Goal: Evaluate if the Hexad user types correspond to
user’s preferences for different game elements
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6. Female,
64
Male,
59
N/A, 10
Methods
1. Survey scale construction
• Expert workshop to generate survey items
• Expert rating to select the best 5 items per user type
2. Data collection and analysis
• 133 participants (40 in the follow-up) – aged 18-36
• demographic information
• Hexad user types
• game elements preferences
• personality (BFI-10 (Rammstedt & John, 2011))
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N=133
B. Rammstedt and O. John. 2007. Measuring personality in one minute or less: A 10-item short version of the Big Five
Inventory in English and German. Journal of Research in Personality 41, 1: 203–212.

7. Survey Validation
User Type α (5 items) α (4 items) r (5 items) r (4 items)
Philanthropist .896 .893 .850 ** .852 **
Socialiser .846 .838 .820 ** .853 **
Free Spirit .727 .723 .483 ** .631 **
Achiever .766 .759 .752 ** .798 **
Disruptor .728 .738 .611 ** .782 **
Player .689 .698 .387 * .357 *
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* p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01.
Internal Consistency Test-Retest
Factor analysis results are available in the paper

8. Survey Availability
The full survey is available in the paper
Also online: https://gamified.uk/UserTypeTest2016/user-type-test.php
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9. Survey Scoring
Exact scoring per user type
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By main user type only
Philanthropist
24%
Achiever
24%
Free
Spirit
22%
Socialiser
19%
Player
10%
Disruptor
1%
N=133
22.36 22.18 22.09
20.33 20.99
14.94
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
Philanthropist
Achiever
FreeSpirit
Socialiser
Player
Disruptor
Mean

10. Preferred Game Elements by User Types
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11. Preferred Game Elements by User Types
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12. Implications
Design
Supporting different user types
Personalizing the user experience
Research
Better understanding of
gamifications mechanisms and
effects
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Philanthropist
24%
Achiever
24%
Free
Spirit
22%
Socialiser
19%
Player
10%
Disruptor
1%
N=133

13. Limitations and Future Work
Repeat the study with a larger sample
Review the subscale for the Player type
Investigate motivations for Philanthropists on a focused
study
Investigate the role of the context in moderating the user
experience
Investigate the similarities of the Hexad with other player
type models
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14. Takeaways
Goal: Propose and validate a survey for the Hexad user types
A standard and validated 24-items survey for assessing Hexad
user types is now available (see the paper for details)
Goal: Evaluate if the user types correspond to user’s preferences
A table of preferred game elements per user type is now
available for:
• Supporting different user types
• Personalizing the user experience in gameful applications
• Further researching the mechanisms and effects of gamification
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15. Thank you!
The Gamification User Types Hexad Scale
http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2967934.2968082
CONTACT
Gustavo F. Tondello
gustavo@tondello.com
@GustavoTondello
http://hcigames.com/
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Thanks to Marim Ganaba (HCI Games Group) for infographic design.