Abstract Book of the 9th International Conference on Future of Teaching and Education and Humanities
Year: 2025
DOI:
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Development And Testing of An Educational Serious Game for Empathy: Merging Theory and Creativity
Julio Cesar Teixeira de Freitas, João Manuel Nunes Piedade, Guilhermina Lobato Miranda, Nelson Zagalo
ABSTRACT:
This study details the development and testing process of the playable prototype of the serious game “Entre Mundos” (translated as “Among Worlds”), designed to enhance players’ empathy levels through the Empathetic Mediators Framework (EMF) and Sociocognitive Learning Theory. The Development Research Methodology, with a comprehensive scope, was adopted, consisting of five stages to ensure the product’s validity, practicality, and effectiveness. This article focuses on the stages of (i) preliminary qualitative study, (ii) non-playable prototype testing, and (iii) playable prototype testing. In stages (i) and (ii), data were collected through interviews with game experts and a focus group comprising high school students, the game’s target audience, and analyzed using content analysis. Stage (iii) involved interviews with academic managers from educational institutions and focus group discussions with students, both analyzed using content analysis. At this stage, there was also a quantitative phase, which involved the administration of the GUESS-18 Scale to high school students (ages 15 to 18) who voluntarily tested the playable prototype (n=75). Content analysis was conducted with the assistance of generative artificial intelligence (ChatGPT 4.0), and quantitative data analysis was performed using SPSS. This study presents a comprehensive analysis of the development process of a serious game with a robust educational foundation, integrating a theoretically grounded empathy model based on sociocognitive neuroscience.
keywords: empathy, game-based learning, game development, serious games, soft skills