We investigate how gender-anonymous voice avatars influence women’s performance in online computing group work. Female participants worked with two male confederates. Voices were filtered according to four voice gender anonymity conditions: (1) All unmasked, (2) Male confederates masked, (3) Female participant masked, and (4) All masked. When only male confederates used masked voices (compared to all unmasked), female participants spoke for a longer period of time and scored higher on computing problems. When everyone used masked voices (compared to all unmasked), female participants spoke for a longer period of time, spoke more words, and scored higher on computing problems. Effects were not significant on subjective measures and one behavioral measure. We discuss the implications for virtual interactions between people.

Avatar customization is known to positively affect crucial outcomes in numerous domains. However, it is unknown whether audial customization can confer the same benefits as visual customization. We conducted a preregistered 2 x 2 (visual choice vs. visual assignment x audial choice vs. audial assignment) study in a Java programming game. Participants with visual choice experienced higher avatar identification and autonomy. Participants with audial choice experienced higher avatar identification and autonomy, but only within the group of participants who had visual choice available. Visual choice led to an increase in time spent, and indirectly led to increases in intrinsic motivation, immersion, time spent, future play motivation, and likelihood of game recommendation. Audial choice moderated the majority of these effects. Our results suggest that audial customization plays an important enhancing role vis-à-vis visual customization. However, audial customization appears to have a weaker effect compared to visual customization. We discuss the implications for avatar customization more generally across digital applications.

Games are now ubiquitous, and educational games are becoming increasingly prevalent. Like other games, educational video games attract participants from different ethnicities and with different gender expressions. As such, educational game designers face a necessity to develop inclusive games. In this paper, we focus on inclusivity, diversity, and equity (DEI) issues by investigating if the computer programming game Mazzy benefited participants from broad demographic backgrounds. We highlight inclusive features present in Mazzy, and, focusing on the participants’ self-reported gender and race/ethnicity, reflect on their play experience and learning outcomes. We found evidence that the game supported learning outcomes and facilitated an engaging play experience for participants from diverse demographic backgrounds. We discuss challenges and implications for the broader literature.

COVID-19 has upended lives everywhere, causing millions of deaths and tens of millions of infections worldwide. Nevertheless, for many people, staying in permanent isolation is neither desirable nor possible. To mitigate the spread of the disease, we iteratively developed a game that teaches hygienic best practices for preventing COVID-19. We consulted professional game designers, health experts, and educational technology designers. We then compared the effectiveness of the game to an equivalent video in two longitudinal experiments during the pandemic: 1) an experiment in a programming lab (N=11), and 2) an online-only experiment (N=475). In Experiment #1, we observe that participants in the game condition had higher intrinsic motivation, and a more sustained rise in hygienic self-efficacy, compared to participants in the video condition. Both conditions saw a rise in COVID-19 knowledge and positive hygienic attitude. Both conditions were relatively unchanged in COVID-19 anxiety and hygienic behavior. In Experiment #2, participants in the game condition experienced greater intrinsic motivation than participants in the video condition. Both conditions saw a sustained rise in COVID-19 hygienic self-efficacy, positive hygienic attitudes, and knowledge. Neither condition saw an effect on COVID-19 anxiety. Our work demonstrates that game-based learning can be an effective approach for teaching COVID-19 hygienic knowledge, for improving COVID-19 hygienic self-efficacy, and for fostering COVID-19 hygienic positive attitudes, and is more intrinsically motivating than video-based learning.