Personality-based reward contingency selection: A player-centered approach to gameplay customization in a serious game for cognitive training

Among the different factors employed in a player-centric design of games, personality has not been well researched. At the same time, rewards are a component that could be better utilized in serious games. While recent research suggests that rewards can be beneficial, the effect of reward contingency on motivation is still unclear. The link between player personality and different motivations to play games, and the differing rewards preferences arising from the different motivations suggests that personality could moderate the effect of a reward contingency on intrinsic motivation. Two studies were conducted to investigate this relationship. In Study I, 60 participants played a block-matching puzzle game that can train executive functions, with each participant randomly assigned to one of three conditions: performance-contingent rewards, which gave rewards after achieving a specific performance level, task-contingent rewards, which gave rewards simply for completing the task, and a no reward condition. Big Five personality traits values of the participants were assessed and related to participants' intrinsic motivation and performance using a linear regression model. A different combination of the five traits significantly predicted motivation and performance in each condition, with the performance-contingent condition yielding significantly higher enjoyment and performance than the other conditions. The efficacy of the linear model was tested in a follow-up Study II, where 30 participants played the same puzzle game, with half the participants given performance-contingent rewards, and the other half being assigned a reward contingency that would maximize their intrinsic motivation and performance based on the model obtained in Study I. Enjoyment and competence subscales of intrinsic motivation, and performance, were significantly higher in the group that received a personality-based contingency as compared to the one that always received performance-contingent rewards. The present work highlights the role of personality in a player-centered game design, and adds to the growing body of literature about rewards not being always detrimental to motivation. Results of the present work demonstrate that serious games can be made more motivating and performance-oriented by appropriately chosen reward contingencies based on player personality.