021 - Achievements, Goals, and Motivation in Games
Psychology of Video Games Podcast
00:00
The Over Justification Effect in Game Design
The over justification effect sounds like a good thing or it was put to good use and the storekeeper example. Although I imagine those kids just went down the street and started smashing some other poor suckers windows. But here it sounds like it could work against the designs of game developers in that once you start offering rewards for things that the players were enjoying anyway, then they don't have a reason to keep playing the game. There's a reason that game designers for years have increasing rewards as you go through a game. You're getting 10,000 compared to 10. So they have to keep upping the ante to make it more worthwhile.
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