The Applications of Psychological Effects in Game Design and Suggestions for Parents and Teenagers

DOI

10.2991/assehr.k.220105.211How to use a DOI?

Keywords

game consumption; psychological effect; behavioral economics; game addiction; teenagers

Abstract

According to the 2020 China Gaming Industry Report released by China Audio-Video and Digital Publishing Association, the annual revenue of China’s gaming industry increased to 278.7 billion yuan (about 43.2 billion U.S. dollars) in 2020, up 20.71% from the previous year [1]. The rapid growth of revenue in the game industry comes from the general increase of players’ spending on games. The rise of spending is inseparable from the well-planned guidance of businesses. From the perspective of behavioral economics and psychology, this paper analyzes how businesses apply psychological effects to game design through theory and application. The psychological effects used by game designers include the foot-in-the-door effect, ratchet effect, scarcity effect, and goal gradient effect. The purpose of this paper is to explore how game designers use multiple psychological effects to induce players to be willing to spend for the game. The results show that the psychological effect is an excellent reference in game design, which makes it difficult for players to escape from the consumption trap well-planned by game designers. Players will eventually become addicted to the game and spend more, especially minors with immature consumption concept.

Copyright

© 2022 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL.

Open Access

This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license.

Download article (PDF)

TY  - CONF
AU  - Xuan Cao
AU  - Yi Huang
PY  - 2022
DA  - 2022/01/17
TI  - The Applications of Psychological Effects in Game Design and Suggestions for Parents and Teenagers
BT  - Proceedings of the 2021 International Conference on Social Development and Media Communication (SDMC 2021)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 1150
EP  - 1154
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.220105.211
DO  - 10.2991/assehr.k.220105.211
ID  - Cao2022
ER  -