Pitfalls for debriefing games and simulations

Pitfalls for debriefing games and simulations: Theory and practice

Roungas, V. (TU Delft Organisation & Governance)
de Wijse, Marieke (Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen)
Meijer, S.A. (TU Delft Organisation & Governance; KTH Royal Institute of Technology)
Verbraeck, A. (TU Delft Policy Analysis)

2018

Debriefing is considered, by many scholars, to be a fundamental part of learning through games and simulations. Despite its significance, there is a lack of research in the area of debriefing, which results in unaddressed factors that inhibit debriefing. Research in the field is complicated by many influencing factors varying from context to game, the purpose of the game, conditions and player specifics, facilitators etc. Insight in the role of these influencing factors can aid in understanding how debriefing can be optimized. In doing this research so far two viewpoints are relevant, the first is the design of debriefing and the second one is the actual execution of the debriefing. The aim of this study is to identify, on the basis of literature, the influence of factors and their interrelation, and subsequently, to categorize them based on expert opinions, so as to determine which pitfalls have the highest influence on inefficiency and ineffectiveness of debriefing. Based on 12 pitfalls identified in literature, and through the use of an online questionnaire, facilitation experts evaluated the extent to which these pitfalls occur due to the design or the execution of the debriefing, and the extent to which they are influenced by the rules of games and simulations. All 12 pitfalls seem to occur in practice, to some extent, due to both the design and the execution of the debriefing. Nevertheless, some pitfalls appear to be more influenced either by design or by execution. Moreover, the results on the extent to which the pitfalls are influenced by the rules of games and simulations are inconclusive, due to the contradiction between the answers on the pre-defined questions and the comments of the experts. A method for further extending the list of pitfalls and verifying the results, hence minimizing the threat to the internal validity of the study, is proposed, which includes a more extensive literature review, interviews, and case studies.

Debriefing
Game and simulations
Pitfalls

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:f46299bb-a32e-4864-8446-ec2f56998749

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78795-4_8

Springer

2018-10-01

9783319787947

Intersections in Simulation and Gaming - 21st Annual Simulation Technology and Training Conference, SimTecT 2016, and 47th International Simulation and Gaming Association Conference, ISAGA 2016, Held as Part of the 1st Australasian Simulation Congress, ASC 2016, Revised Selected Papers, 10711 LNCS

21st Annual Simulation Technology and Training Conference, SimTecT 2016 and 47th International Simulation and Gaming Association Conference, ISAGA 2016 Held as Part of the 1st Australasian Simulation Congress, ASC 2016, 2016-09-26 → 2016-09-29, Melbourne, Australia

Lecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics), 0302-9743, 10711 LNCS

Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.

Institutional Repository

conference paper

© 2018 V. Roungas, Marieke de Wijse, S.A. Meijer, A. Verbraeck