Research & the AFFECT Framework
Practice comes first in my work. Research is how I check whether what works in my classroom works for other teachers too.
What 14 expert trainers agreed on
In a Delphi study, my co-authors and I asked experienced corporate trainers — each with at least three years of gamified teaching at Taiwan's 500 largest listed companies — to rate 35 candidate gamification elements. Experts rated each item privately, saw the group's ratings, and rated again. Fourteen completed all three rounds. Twelve elements met the bar for "key."
The highest scores did not go to a game element. They went to design principles. Ranked by the experts:
| Principle | Expert rating (out of 5) | |
|---|---|---|
| A | Aligned with learning goals | 5.0 |
| F | Feedback, immediately | 5.0 |
| F | Fair & clear rules | 4.9 (rules) · 4.7 (fairness) |
| E | Escalating challenge | 4.5 |
| C | Competition in teams | 4.4 (teams) · 4.3 (competition) |
| T | Try without risk | 4.3 (experiential activities) · 4.1 (no risk of failure) |
Read the first letters down the list: AFFECT. It is not a menu of game parts. It is a design order — what to get right first, and what to build on top.
Among game elements, points held up (4.4). Badges did not: they averaged 3.0, and only 14% of the experts rated them important. That is why, in my book, the B in PBL stands for Benefits — points, benefits and leaderboards — not badges.
Published papers
Wang, Y.-F., Hsu, Y.-F., & Fang, K. (2022). The key elements of gamification in corporate training – The Delphi method. Entertainment Computing, 40, 100463. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.entcom.2021.100463
Entertainment Computing Best Paper of 2022 award.
Wang, Y.-F., Hsu, Y.-F., Fang, K.-T., & Kuo, L.-T. (2024). Gamification in medical education: identifying and prioritizing key elements through Delphi method. Medical Education Online, 29(1), 2302231. https://doi.org/10.1080/10872981.2024.2302231
Both papers rank among the top 1% most-cited papers in their field and year. The 2024 medical-education study is in the top 0.07%, cited about 43 times the field average (OpenAlex field- and year-normalized citation percentile, checked October 2026). In medical education, the experts' top-ranked elements again began with alignment to instructional objectives, clear game rules and rapid feedback — the same foundation, in a very different classroom.
Triangular Learning Theory
My doctoral research in Information Management looked at why some teaching techniques work so consistently in adult classrooms. The result is Triangular Learning Theory, which connects behavioral, cognitive and constructivist learning theory to the everyday techniques trainers use. Read the introduction →
Academic name: Yung-Fu Wang. Ph.D. in Information Management.
Use it in your next session
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