EXTENDING GAMING DEMAND: SUBJECTIVE EXPERIENCES OF COGNITIVE, EMOTIONAL, PHYSICAL, AND SOCIAL VIDEOGAMING REQUIREMENTS

Videogames directly involve players as co-creators of on-screen events, and this interactivity is assumed to be a core source of their attraction as a successful entertainment medium. Although interactivity is an inherent property of the videogame, it is variably perceived by the end user—for some users, perceived as a more demanding process, taxing their already-limited attentional resources. At least four such demands have been explicated in extant literature: cognitive (making sense of game logics/tasks), emotional (affective responses to game events/outcomes), physical (managing controller inputs and interfaces), and social (responding to human/nonhuman in-game others). Past work has reported empirical support of these concepts through validation of closed-ended survey metrics (e.g., Video Game Demand Scale). The current study challenges and extends the demand concept through an analysis of players’ own language when describing videogame demands in short essays about gaming experiences—critical given that people may experience a phenomenon in ways not accounted for in deductive data approaches. A secondary analysis of qualitative data made freely available by VGDS authors revealed both convergence with and divergence from prior work. Comporting with VGDS, cognitive demands are mostly experienced by players as ludic concerns and physical demands are mostly experienced in relation to handheld controller perceptions. Diverging from VGDS, players’ emotional demands represented both basic and complex emotional states, and social demands manifest different depending on whether or not the social “other” is human or non-human: humans are considered demanding on interpersonal terms, whereas non-humans are considered demanding as personified evocative objects.

Confusion and Failure in Facilitating Generalized Social Responding in the School Setting: Sometimes 2 + 2 = 5

Although social skills instruction is widely cited as an effective intervention for a variety of problem behaviors, research does not support the generalization of its effects across settings. Practices that have been sufficient to achieve generalization in academic instruction have been insufficient in achieving similar outcomes for social instruction. Historical confusion and failure in facilitating generalized behaviors can be attributed to the complexity of the social environment. Due to the complexity of this problem, those who provide social skills instruction must adapt best practices for instruction and generalization. This article (a) analyzes generalization failures; (b) outlines some critical differences between instruction in social and academic skill areas; and (c) suggests the depth of analysis, instruction, and facilitation that will be required to achieve generalization of social skills.

Peer Social Initiations: Effective Intervention for Social Skills Development of Exceptional Children

Deficits in the area of social skills represent one of the more pervasive disabilities exhibited by exceptional children. The social initiation intervention, in which nonhandicapped children are taught to direct social overtures to exceptional students, is one tactic that has been found repeatedly to result in positive social behavior change. This intervention technique derives primarily from the naturalistic study of peer interactions that show the predictable influence of social initiations on the behavior of interacting partners. Extensive evaluations of this technique have revealed no negative side effects on peer trainers and increases in the social responding, social initiations, and length of exchanges for target childen.