University of Applied Sciences Hamburg

EmotionBike: A Study of Provoking Emotions in Cycling Exergames

This study investigates the efficacy of game design elements in provoking specific, real-time emotional responses within cycling exergames.

• Game mechanics like obstacles and rewards can effectively trigger specific emotional responses, with 91% of participants displaying joy during falling events and 82% showing joy upon hitting targets.
• Individual personality traits, particularly extroversion, significantly correlate with the intensity of emotional expressions during gameplay.
• Emotional responses to specific events, such as jump scares, show high variance and do not always align with a player's self-reported feelings.