Self-Determination Theory, Part 1

Posted on July 17, 2012 by Joseph Hilgard

Joe Hilgard

Why do we play games? Recently, research has started to apply theories from motivation psychology to understand why people enjoy the games that they do. This is Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000), and it is rapidly gaining popularity in game studies.

Self-Determination Theory (SDT) proposes that all people have three basic psychological needs. The first is autonomy, the feeling of being in control of one’s own actions, as opposed to being controlled or commanded by someone else. Next is competence, the feeling of having ability, growing in skill, and being able to meet challenges. The last is relatedness, the feeling of caring for and being cared for by others. Self-Determination Theory predicts that people will find an activity intrinsically motivating (that is, they will want to do it for the sake of doing it, rather than to earn a reward) to the extent that it meets these three psychological needs.

A psychologist named Andrew Przybylski has done some promising early research looking to whether games satisfy these psychological needs. In one study, Przybylski had participants either play a critically well-reviewed game (Ocarina of Time) or a critical flop (A Bug’s Life 64). Players who played the better videogame not only reported enjoying it more, but they also reported greater feelings of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. In another study, participants played three different videogames, all equally well-reviewed. Participants turned out to like these games more or less depending on the extent to which they felt that these games met their needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

We can conclude that, to at least some degree, people are playing games to satisfy their psychological needs. This research raises three questions. The first, the subject of today’s piece, is a psychology question: do people play games for reasons other than to satisfy needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness? The second is a design question: How can we make games which best satisfy people’s psychological needs? The third is a personality psychology question: what is it about a particular person that determines whether a certain game meets or fails to meet their needs?

 Autonomy

 

Personally, I find one of these to be much more autonomy-supportive than the other.

The combination of the last two questions reflect my greatest curiosity and greatest criticisms about today’s videogames. To me, games today seem increasingly linear and simple. As best I can understand, linear or heavily proscriptive games should stifle player’s experience of autonomy. It’s clear that open-world games like The Elder Scrolls or MMORPGS are becoming increasingly popular, but at the same time, there is a definite trend towards restrictive games which tell the player what to do and when.

Let’s begin the Two Minutes Hate and pick on Modern Warfare 3’s single-player campaign for a while. We criticize MW3 for being “on rails” because the player feels that MW3 fails to be autonomy-supportive. When the player wants to do something, s/he isn’t allowed to: instead, the player gets pushed out of the way so that s/he doesn’t end up interfering with the next scripted event. The player is not free to explore or make decisions for himself – instead, you spend a fair portion of the game behind a “follow” prompt so that you move through the cinematic setpieces in the way the developer wants you to. Remembering the infamous “No Russian” mission from MW2, the player is forced to participate in a massacre, and the game ends abruptly if the player attempts to do anything but follow orders. At times, one isn’t so much a “player” of Modern Warfare’s single-player campaign as one is a member of its audience.

On the whole, however, people seem to be pretty fond of Modern Warfare’s single-player and other heavily-scripted games like it. What is different between me and the die-hard fans? Maybe I’m just a cranky old coot who has played too many games and knows too well when I’m being railroaded. Alternatively, maybe having played certain games which provided exceptional autonomy (maybe something like Fallout or X-COM or Dungeon Crawl or even board games) raises one’s expectations & turns somebody into a bit of a snob. Finally, it’s also possible that we enjoy on-rails “experiences” like Modern Warfare for reasons not covered by Self-Determination Theory. Maybe it’s simply exciting or spectacular, something that washes over us like fireworks or a rollercoaster, and we find that to be fun or motivating.

 

This entry was posted in Criticism and tagged a bug's life 64 , Andrew Przybylski , autonomy , Dungeon Crawl , , fps map design , , game studies , , modern warfare 3 , ocarina of time , psychology , references to 1984 , self-determination theory , the elder scrolls , why do we play games , . Bookmark the permalink .
  • Christine Watson

    I think some players of these types of on-rails things might be less ‘gamers’ and more ‘fans of semi-interactive movies’.

    Ever since Raph Koster posted some articles on why ‘story’ should not be called a a game mechanic and can actually detract from quality gameplay, I’ve been thinking about what games I’ve loved the most and which have only been short-term entertainment, and it really does seem to me that the more scripted wannabe-cinema a game has, the weaker the actual gameplay seems to be because of it.

    I think the diminishing returns of graphic improvement is part of it too — for a while, when the eyecandy kept getting better by leaps and bounds people didn’t notice the comparatively weak gameplay innovations in comparison. Dev studios seem to have got it into their heads that they should ape movies and books at the expense of stronger game design. But now I think since so many of us are ‘used to’ good looking games, we’re starting to nitpick this trend of flash over substance. I think it’s also why indie games are getting more traction nowadays. When you don’t have amazing graphics and cutscenes, the game has to stand on it’s own merits as a fun experience.

  • It continues to surprise me when anyone seems to look at games as either “linear experiences” or “opportunities for autonomy.” I feel like I’ve seen very little acknowledgement that a game like Fallout, or even Minecraft, has a significantly linear experience to it. All of the missions in Fallout are themselves linear, even if they branch off once or twice, or offer a “good” and a “bad” ending, and early Minecraft players all tend to go through a very similar first 10 hours of play, even if their worlds, the monsters, and the goodies they collect are technically different each time.

    I think as people keep snubbing “linear” experiences, developers are trying to stay a step ahead and disguise the linearity of their games in new ways. Players, over time, have gathered better game-thinking skills and are noticing how games force them into certain actions. When they notice that they’ve been forced to act like the game wants them to, we get the Mass Effect 3 meltdown, and when they don’t notice, immensely story-driven, “linear” games like Half Life 2 become fan darlings.

    Early on in the histories of film and the modern novel, there were artists who decided story was not a part of their medium. Un Chien Andalou is not intended firstly to tell a story, it’s a collection of moving images. William S. Burroughs and the Beat Poets wrote novels focused on the sounds and positions of words, not on their own stories. In a bit of a weird turn, games without story, based only on mechanics, might be more palatable and marketable than story-telling, but that doesn’t separate these experiences significantly.

    • JosephHilgard

      This is an interesting point that I failed to address in this article: linearity doesn’t necessarily imply a lack of autonomy! I have enjoyed a number of puzzle games recently (Portal 2, Spacechem, Q.U.B.E.) which are “linear” in that the player plays the same levels in the same sequence every time, and may not branch off. Additionally, in Portal 2 or Q.U.B.E., puzzles have only one solution – the player does not have the opportunity of making his/her choice of solution to the puzzle.

      However, in any of these linear puzzle games, the player is still invited to arrive at the solution autonomously. The game stays out of the player’s way. The player is allowed to play and experiment until a solution is found. It doesn’t come up behind you and urge you to put the red nine on the black ten, to borrow an analogy from John Teti. It certainly doesn’t slap you on the wrist for trying to open the door before your squadmates, and it doesn’t lock you in a room until the grown-ups are done talking at you.

      I absolutely appreciate your comment, though. While games may have some branching paths or even open worlds, the actual sequence of player actions can still remain the same each game.

  • Steven Sukkau

    I wonder if Autonomy and Competence are sometimes at odds with each other in games. While the FPS map from ’93 certainly provides more autonomy to the player, it also provides more instances to feel incompetent. And while the COD series strips most of the player’s autonomy, it more than makes up for in making us feel competent.

  • http://twitter.com/CaramelZappa Caramelzappa

    What’s wrong with having both experiences? Linear, scripted games are really great for portraying certain things. They world well with great production value, character development, and core combat that’s polished to a shine, etc.

    More open ended games seem to suffer in a lot of those regards. A game like Fallout 3 has a million different options, but the core gunplay is medicore at best, and downright terrible at worst. Same goes for the animation and voice acting for the most part.

    Both styles have their pros and cons, but to say one is intrinsically better seems a little silly to me. Look at the very basic examples of Mario Vs. Zelda. Both are considered classic, amazing games. But Zelda has you explore a whole world, and Mario is the definition of linear. There’s only one way forward, and maybe two ways to kill the enemy in front of you. That’s not bad, it’s just a different design. To say that linear, restrictive games is a new trend is a bit dishonest I think.

    Comparing a great all around game like Ocarina in Time to a complete travesty like Bugs Life 64 isn’t really a good way to judge one single factor. It’s not really a good judge of anything. Comparing two exceptionally well executed games in their respected category might be useful, but would still leave lots of room for error in terms of players feeling too challenged/not enough, not engaged to story, not engaged with the core combat, and a myriad of other factors that have little to nothing to do with autonomy.

    And that picture is misleading really. Doom is an incredibly linear game. There are no two ways to progress. You have to get each door key to move forward. You might waste time wandering around the same hall for 20 minutes looking for it, but is that really giving you more options as a player, or just providing the illusion of it? And if it is just an illusion, is that good enough?