Why Students Engage in "Gaming the System" Behavior in Interactive Learning Environments
📜 Abstract
In this research, we study learners who “game the system” in interactive learning environments, and attempt to gain the correct answer through means which systematically bypass the need to engage in the material being taught. We focus specifically on whether these students are simply trying occasionally to use resources such as context-sensitive hints and feedback within the learning environment as a crutch for overcoming a difficult problem or if these learners use these resources to try to game the system, obtaining correct answers without learning. We investigate these hypotheses by re-analyzing the educational data in a new model we call the Integrated Model. This model allows us to hypothesize various types of gaming behavior, distinguishing between learners who complete the problems through effort and those who only aim to complete the problems. Results suggest there are significant differences in how students engage with hints and feedback provided by cognitive tutors, and how these differences correlate with educational outcomes and motivations.
✨ Summary
This paper investigates the phenomenon of students “gaming the system” in interactive learning environments (ILEs) by bypassing the learning process to obtain correct answers with minimal effort. The authors developed the Integrated Model to analyze educational data, differentiating between genuine student effort and attempts to game the system. The study found considerable differences in student engagement with hints and feedback in cognitive tutors and how these differences correlate with learning outcomes and student motivation.
Following a search for the impact of this paper, it appears to be influential in educational research related to ILEs and intelligent tutoring systems. It has been referenced in works discussing student engagement, behavior modeling, and the design of educational technologies. Some notable citations include: - Koedinger, K. R., & Aleven, V. (2007). In “Exploring the assistance dilemma in experiments with cognitive tutors” (link). - Aleven, V., et al. (2006). In “Toward meta-cognitive tutoring: A model of help seeking with a cognitive tutor” published in the “International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education” (link). - Arroyo, I., et al. (2007). In “The impact of student modeling on student performance in an intelligent tutoring system” (link).
These papers extend the research by discussing the dynamics of educational interventions and their impact on student learning processes.