Differential Impact of the Positive and Negative Image of Digital Games on University Students' Computational Thinking

This study, presented at DiGRA 2024, examines whether university students' perceptions of digital games relate to their computational thinking abilities. The authors frame computational thinking as an essential 21st-century skill and argue that learners' images and impressions of subject matter shape learning outcomes, so the image students hold of games may influence how well games support problem-solving development. The research aims to provide foundational findings for designing educational uses of digital games.

The survey was conducted in September 2023 among 180 students from a Faculty of Information Science in Japan, yielding 158 valid responses (146 men and 12 women) after excluding incomplete submissions and non-players. Participants completed a web-based questionnaire of roughly 15 minutes that combined a scale measuring images of digital games, with seven factors covering personal and social impressions, skill improvement, special experiences, extensive communication, health and dependence, negative ideological effects, and physical inactivity, alongside a Japanese-adapted computational thinking scale assessing creativity, algorithmic thinking, cooperativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. Students were divided into four groups by whether their positive and negative image scores fell above or below the mean, and these groups were compared using ANOVA with Tukey HSD post-hoc tests.

Descriptive results showed that students held relatively favorable impressions, with the highest mean for special experiences and positive impressions (4.52), while personal and social bad impressions scored lowest (2.42). The group analysis found significant differences in creativity (F = 8.61, p < .01) and critical thinking (F = 4.19, p < .01). Students with both positive and negative images scored higher than others on creativity, and those with stronger positive images scored higher on creativity than those with weaker ones. Critical thinking was lower in the group with a low positive and high negative image than in the groups with higher positive images. The authors caution that the direction of this relationship is ambiguous, since negative views could reduce critical thinking or low critical thinking could foster negative views. The study is limited by its single-institution, male-dominated sample and its cross-sectional design, and the authors call for broader surveys and practical testing of educational game materials.