Why do we seek out and enjoy uncertain success in playing games? Game designers and researchers suggest that games whose challenges match player skills afford engaging experiences of achievement, ...competence, or effectance—of
doing well
. Yet, current models struggle to explain why such balanced challenges best afford these experiences and do not straightforwardly account for the appeal of high- and low-challenge game genres like Idle and Soulslike games. In this article, we show that Predictive Processing (PP) provides a coherent formal cognitive framework which can explain the fun in tackling game challenges with uncertain success as the dynamic process of reducing uncertainty surprisingly efficiently. In gameplay as elsewhere, people enjoy
doing better than expected
, which can track learning progress. In different forms, balanced, Idle, and Soulslike games alike afford regular accelerations of uncertainty reduction. We argue that this model also aligns with a popular practitioner model, Raph Koster’s
Theory of Fun for Game Design
, and can unify currently differentially modelled gameplay motives around competence and curiosity.
Learning to use, make, and modify tools is key to our species' success. Researchers have hypothesized that play with objects may have a foundational role in the ontogeny of tool use and, over ...evolutionary timescales, in cumulative technological innovation. Yet, there are few systematic studies investigating children's interactions with objects outside the post-industrialized West. Here, we survey the ethnohistorical record to uncover cross-cultural trends regarding hunter-gatherer children's use of objects during play and instrumental activities. Our dataset, consisting of 434 observations of children's toys and tools from 54 hunter-gatherer societies, reveals several salient trends: Most objects in our dataset are used in play. Children readily manufacture their own toys, such as dolls and shelters. Most of the objects that children interact with are constructed from multiple materials. Most of the objects in our dataset are full-sized or miniature versions of adult tools, reflecting learning for adult roles. Children also engage with objects related to child culture, primarily during play. Taken together, our findings show that hunter-gatherer children grow up playing, making, and learning with objects.
Leg er ikke kun for born og barnlige sjAele. Alle vi kedelige voksne leger ogsa. Vi giver bare kun fantasien frit spil sammen med familie og gode venner. Der er nu ingen grund til at vAere flov over ...vores legesyge ifolge Marc Malmdorf Andersen, hojtudviklet legebarn ved Aarhus Universitet. For leg er en form for videnskab, hvor vi ved at afprove det ene skore pafund efter det andet ikke bare bliver bedre voksne og mere kreative; vi kan ogsa fa kAerligheden til at vokse og redde hele verden. Det er da ikke noget at ga stille med dorene med, nar det tilmed er smadderskAegt.
In this article, we argue that a predictive processing framework (PP) may provide elements for a proximate model of play in children and adults. We propose that play is a behavior in which the agent, ...in contexts of freedom from the demands of certain competing cognitive systems, deliberately seeks out or creates surprising situations that gravitate toward sweet-spots of relative complexity with the goal of resolving surprise. We further propose that play is experientially associated with a feel-good quality because the agent is reducing significant levels of prediction error (i.e., surprise) faster than expected. We argue that this framework can unify a range of well-established findings in play and developmental research that highlights the role of play in learning, and that casts children as Bayesian learners. The theory integrates the role of positive valence in play (i.e., explaining why play is fun); and what it is to be in a playful mood. Central to the account is the idea that playful agents may create and establish an environment tailored to the generation and further resolution of surprise and uncertainty. Play emerges here as a variety of niche construction where the organism modulates its physical and social environment in order to maximize the productive potential of surprise.
Haunted attractions are illustrative examples of recreational fear in which people voluntarily seek out frightening experiences in pursuit of enjoyment. We present findings from a field study at a ...haunted-house attraction where visitors between the ages of 12 and 57 years (N = 110) were equipped with heart rate monitors, video-recorded at peak scare points during the attraction, and asked to report on their experience. Our results show that enjoyment has an inverted-U-shaped relationship with fear across repeated self-reported measures. Moreover, results from physiological data demonstrate that the experience of being frightened is a linear function of large-scale heart rate fluctuations, whereas there is an inverted-U-shaped relationship between participant enjoyment and small-scale heart rate fluctuations. These results suggest that enjoyment is related to forms of arousal dynamics that are “just right.” These findings shed light on how fear and enjoyment can coexist in recreational horror.
In creativity research it is often claimed that creativity pertains to persons and products as well as processes. However, most studies have focused on the creative potential of persons and their ...creative products in detriment of looking at the creative process itself or investigating all three facets of creativity in the same study. In this article, we report on a study that investigated children's creative potential, iterations in their creative process, and the effects of these factors on their creative products. Twenty-seven children aged 10–12 participated in a LEGO building task and were asked to build creative products in a five-step iterative process (for a total of 135 creative products). Children’s creative potential was then assessed with an Alternative Uses Task. Finally, children’s creative products were evaluated by six expert raters using a Consensual Assessment Technique. Results revealed statistically significant effects of iterations in the creative process on children's creative products. Specifically, iterations significantly increased originality but decreased task-appropriateness of the creative products. These results suggest that, in children, iterations in creative processes might facilitate exploration but inhibit exploitation. We found no statistically significant effects of children's creative potential on their creative products, supporting domain specificity in creativity. These findings represent some of the first empirical evidence showcasing the effects of iteration on originality and appropriateness in children’s creative products, emphasizing the importance of investigating creative processes in children. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved) (Source: journal abstract)
Studies of cultural transmission—whether approached by archaeological or ethnographic means—have made great strides in identifying formal teaching and learning arrangements, which in turn can be ...closely aligned with models of social learning. While novices and apprentices are often in focus in such studies, younger children and their engagement with material culture have received less attention. Against the backdrop of a cross-cultural database of ethnographically documented object use and play in 54 globally distributed foraging communities, we here discuss the ways in which children make and use tools and toys. We provide a cross-cultural inventory of objects made for and by hunter–gatherer children and adolescents. We find that child and adolescent objects are linked to adult material culture, albeit not exclusively so. Toys and tools were primarily handled outside of explicit pedagogical contexts, and there is little evidence for formalised apprenticeships. Our data suggests that children’s self-directed interactions with objects, especially during play, has a critical role in early-age enskillment. Placed within a niche construction framework, we combine ethnographic perspectives on object play with archaeological evidence for play objects to offer an improved cross-cultural frame of reference for how social learning varies across early human life history and what role material culture may play in this process. While our analysis improves the systematic understanding of the role and relevance of play objects among hunter–gatherer societies, we also make the case for more detailed studies of play objects in the context of ethnographic, archival and archaeological cultural transmission research.
Why do people seek out frightening leisure activities
such as horror films and haunted attractions, and does the experience benefit
them in any way? In this article, we address these questions ...through two
separate studies. In Study 1, we asked American horror fans
(n = 256) why they like horror and identified
three overall types of horror fans, which we term "Adrenaline
Junkies," "White Knucklers," and "Dark
Copers." In Study 2, we collected data from Danish visitors at a haunted
house attraction (n = 258) and replicated the
findings from Study 1 by finding the same three types of horror fans.
Furthermore, we show that these three types of horror fans report distinct
benefits from horror experiences. Adrenaline Junkies reported immediate
enjoyment, White Knucklers reported personal growth, and Dark Copers reported
both. These results suggest that frightening leisure activities are not only an
outlet for sensation-seeking, and that the allure of horror may have as much to
do with learning and personal growth as it has with high-arousal fun.
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