Yes indeed! We can see the flow theory not only in serious games but also on the commercial games where the intention is only entertainment. However, the balance between Challenge and Skills is a little bit hard to find. The designer must take into account the player's skills to develop or to gamify something to promote fun and engagement. And I think that's only possible when we understand the mechanisms which make the difficulty of the game adaptable to player's skills.

It is relevant, but not so much as self-determination theory (SDT). Although people talk about flow in gamification, they talk much, much more about SDT. I believe flow is not so easily achievable in gamification as it is in games because the user is usually less immersed in a gamified application than in games.

This is the only paper that I know of that has actually tried to measure flow in gamification: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563214004221. In contrast, there are several papers relating and measuring competence, autonomy and relatedness (SDT's components) in gamification.

This might also be useful: https://www.gamified.uk/?s=flow

 Hey Rod, 

I basically agree with previous answers and would additionally mention the specific objective of the gamification process at hand.

If we consider gamification as a specific design and development process that differs in its characteristics from traditional game design and game development as well as from the design and development of other applications, then i would argue that it is adequate to accomplish specific objectives, we would not with other design approaches.

Based on this argumentation, it would depend on the given objectives. As an example i would argue that flow is rather relevant in the design and evaluation of a gamified fitness application, that aims to motivate its users to do sport continuously for at least 2 hours. The emergence of a flow experience would be highly desirable in this context.

In contrast, for a fitness application that rather shall motivate users to utilize their every-day environments as opportunities for some physical activation (using stairs instead of elevator), flow experience may be less relevant.

In summary, the design objectives of the gamification process would determine how relevant flow shall be. As in many other cases, i would not give a generalizable Yes or No answer to your question.

Hope this may help a bit. Excited to discuss your perspective :)

Hello Philip,

I would agree with the points made by yourself and Gustavo, that it is context dependent. For example. as noted sometimes the gamified application is not in active use all the time but rather something which encourages certain activities which are then in some way measured or entered into the app. Examples could be when exercising or alternatively when driving a car (when app use is forbidden but using the app after the driving task is not). I would also agree that SDT is perhaps a more applicable theory than flow for many aspects. Veli-Pekkas reference on Pervasive game flow is something I will check out in more detail.

In general I think it is case of considering flow in the direct (i.e. while using the actual app) vs the in-direct experience (when the app is in the background but driving the user behaviour).

Regards,

Rod

Dear Rod,

I've been working on gamification (and game studies) for several years now. We applied it in several areas, including education, sports (exergames) and industrial production.

Flow theory is wonderful, as it is easy to understand and teach. However, similar to other simple models (e.g. Bartle's player types, ekman's FACS) it does not map the full complexity of human motivation. Nevertheless it helps to

1. design interventions in gamified applications

2. trigger new research improving the model

I have attached links to a few publications in various areas, which all relate to flow theory.

Conference Paper Industrial playgrounds: How gamification helps to enrich wor...

Article Assistive technologies at home and in the workplace—a field ...

Article Gamification of Business Processes: Re-designing Work in Pro...

Conference Paper Gamification of a Workday: A Study on the Effects in Shelter...

HI Oliver thanks for the papers and your comments. I agree with what you say with respect to it and the work of Bartel not mapping fully onto gamification. Also as you say flow theory can act as a catalyst for informing the design process.

I actually disagree with the above posters who say gamification is related to the flow state. 

I think many of them are actually referring to serious games or games for change (or whatever your favorite way of saying it is), which are games designed to achieve a real-world outcome of some sort. Gamification, on the other hand, is simply using game-like structures (such as points, awards, leaderboards, etc.) to motivate people to do what the designers want them to do. These include systems such as frequent flyer miles on your credit card, Boy Scout merit badges, and gamified apps like Foursquare that encourage specific consumer behaviors. Even this website is lightly gamified with an upvote system and prompts to take certain actions.

None of this has anything to do with the flow state which is created by very specific circumstances. These are simply motivative carrots that tap into other psychological facets of the human psyche. Gamification may be more closely related to another game/psychology term, fiero, which is not a state like flow, but the more isolated and momentary feeling people get when they achieve something that was difficult (such as getting to the #1 spot on a leader board).