Human Computation and Human Subject Tasks in Social Network Playful Applications

Abstract

Universal connectivity has made crowdsourcing - an online activity of a crowd toward the completion of a goal requested by someone in an open call - possible. The question rises whether users can be motivated to perform those tasks by intrinsic rather than extrinsic factors (money, valuables). The current work explores the gamification approach in order to appeal to the intrinsic motivation of players Namely, instead of bringing the serious task into the major focus of the contributors, it proposes to use storytelling and playful metaphors as the elements that can mask the serious tasks and at the same time may attract the attention of potential contributors. Furthermore, it explores the possibilities of constructing such system as social network playful applications and employs Facebook as a distribution platform. The results demonstrate a positive feedback of the players. Identified are also differences in female and male players' attitudes, which gives space for a deeper research of the players' profiling and motivation in the future.