Attitudes and practices of medical students regarding video-games: should community medicine educationists get serious about serious games
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18203/2394-6040.ijcmph20170748Keywords:
Attitudes, Medical students, New media, Practices, Serious games, Video gamesAbstract
Background: Present medicos belong to a generation called ‘Millennials’ or ‘Net Generation’. They spend less time reading, and are more comfortable in image-rich environments provided by New Media. The objective of the study is to identify knowledge, attitudes and practices of medical students regarding video-games, with the aim of prompting community medicine teachers to consider serious games as a teaching-learning tool.
Methods: The study was conducted among undergraduate medical students who self-administered a structured questionnaire eliciting their practices and attitudes regarding video-games, perceptions regarding impact of video-gaming on their academic performances and acceptability of serious games as a learning tool in community medicine.
Results: A total of 255 medical students participated in the study, out of which 242 (94.9%) were current video-gamers. The students started playing video-games at a mean age of 11.72+3.63 years. Mobile phones were the commonest platform for video-gaming. The median duration of video-gaming was 150 minutes/week, with semi-inter-quartile range of 255 minutes. 57.4% of students reported that video-games helped them relax, while 26% felt that video-gaming increased their skills. The study revealed that 43.6% students were aware of serious games and 22.7% had used them as a learning tool in last three months. Moreover, about 95% of medicos welcomed learning of community medicine through serious games.
Conclusions: The study reveals that contemporary medical students are spending considerable time playing video-games. It also shows that the learner is willing to learn community medicine through serious games. The study prompts community medicine educationists to consider serious games as a teaching-learning tool.
Metrics
References
Oblinger D. Boomers, Gen-Xers, and Millennials: Understanding the ‘new students’, Educause Review 2003;38:37-47.
Black A. Gen Y: Who they are and how they learn. Educational Horizon 2010; 88:92-101.
Sweeny T. How the new generation of well wired multi-taskers is changing campus culture. Chronicle of Higher Education, 2007. Available at http://www.surveyu.com/images/pdf/well-wired_01-05-2007.pdf (Last accessed 10 Dec 2016)
Kron FW, Gjerde CL, Sen A, Fetters MD. Medical student attitude toward video games and related new media technologies in medical education, BMC Medical Education 2010. Available at http://bmcmededuc.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/147269201050 (Last accessed 10 Dec 2016)
Friedman CP. The marvelous medical education machine or how medical education can be "unstuck" in time, Medical Teacher. 2000;22:496-502.
Holzinger A, Kickmeir-Rust M, Albert D. Dynamic media in computer science education: Content complexity and learning performance: Is less more? Educational Technology & Society. 2008;11:279-90.
Abt CC. Serious Games. New York: Viking Compass; 1975.
Akl EA, Pretorius RW, Erdley WS, Sackett K, Bhoopathi PS, Alfarah Z et al. The effect of educational games on medical students’ learning outcomes: a systematic review. BEME Guide number 14. Available at www.bemecollabaration.org/downloads/801/beme_14_for_website.pdf (Last accessed 11 Dec 2016)
Graafland M, Schraagen JM, Schijven MP. Systematic review of serious games for medical education and surgical skill training. Br J Surg 2012;99(10):1322-30.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
