Debra Lieberman presented on trends and innovative studies in health games research. She highlighted several standout randomized controlled trials that tested health games for conditions like cognitive decline, obesity, HIV prevention, and pain management. She also discussed the use of virtual worlds, avatars, motion sensors, and self-tracking games to promote behavior change and improve health outcomes. Federal agencies are increasingly supporting health game research and development through funding opportunities.

1. Research on Games for Health: Trends,
Innovations, and Standout Studies
Debra Lieberman, Ph.D.
Health Games Research, UC Santa Barbara
Presentation at
Games for Health Conference
Boston, June 28, 2013

2. Introduction: Debra Lieberman, Ph.D.
 Media researcher, and faculty member
 University of California, Santa Barbara
 Alzheimer’s Association / Intel grant on cognitive health
 Director, Health Games Research
 National program funded by the Pioneer Portfolio of the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
 Works to advance the research, design, and effectiveness
of health games
 www.healthgamesresearch.org
 www.healthgamesresearch.org/db

3. Where are the shining examples in our field?
 Innovative games
 Rigorous research methods
 Significant effects on health or health care
 The best our field has to offer
 I gathered recommendations and selected studies
that I have read that impressed me
 Not a systematic, thorough search – Big field

4. Literature reviews of health game
randomized controlled trials (RCTs)
 (Various time periods, search methods, inclusion criteria)
 Baranowski et al., 2008 (27 RCTs)
 Kharrazi et al., 2012 (149 RCTs)
 Primack et al., 2012 (38 RCTs)
 Rahmani & Boren, 2012 (45 RCTs)
 Hieftje et al. 2013 (electronic media for children, 19 RCTs)
 Larsen et al., 2013 (physical effects of exergames on healthy
elderly, 7 RCTs)
 Lu et al., 2013 (childhood obesity, 14 RCTs)

5. Federal agencies and games
 Plague Inc. mobile game asks players to save humanity.
CDC will appear in-game with news and new game
challenges http://ow.ly/m7BDN
 Many more calls for proposals in NIH, NSF, CDC
involving health games

6. Health plans and insurers

7. Game contests and prizes
 Future of Health Awards, from Games for Health
Europe http://www.gamesforhealtheurope.org/awards/foha2012
 5 nominees and one winner each year
 RWJF

8. Prevention
 POX, Save the People
 Kognito games use avatars to help people identify
and respond to emotional and mental health
problems

9. Safe sex and AIDS prevention
 SOLVE-IT is a 3D animated game with intelligent
agents/technologies for changing sexually risky
behavior for young MSM that was tested with an RCT
nationally over the web with a fairly large sample.
Study is in progress. (Lynn Miller)
 iPad game for at-risk teens aims to prevent HIV
transmission http://ow.ly/dsEKz -- Designed at Yale
School of Medicine (Lynn Fiellin)

10. Disease self-management

11. Games for medical treatment and health care

12. Treatment, pain management, anxiety reduction
 Snow World (pain distraction)
 iPad games and apps distract children and reduce their
anxiety before surgery http://ow.ly/m2AuD

13. Emotional health

14. Treatment for autism, special needs

15. Melissa DeRosier: CEO and Founder of C-3
Institute for Social Developent www.3cisd.com
Social-emotional skill-building games
Zoo U: social skills tutoring based on criterion-based
mastery model
Adventures Aboard the S.S.GRIN: builds social
emotional skills through exploration and problem-
solving in a virtual story world
Stories in Motion: visual narrative enables users to
visualize successful social paths through difficult
social challenges

16. Evaluation of Zoo U
 Correlations between in-game social skills
assessments and independently obtained standard
psychological assessments of the same students
and
 High levels of engagement and likeability among
students

17. Virtual worlds, virtual reality
 Virtual weight management in Second Life improves
actual weight loss and maintenance http://ow.ly/lbLkP
Study: http://ow.ly/lbKVk
 Using Virtual Reality to Identify Actual Disorders
http://ow.ly/cTAK2 from Skip Rizzo's lab at USC, to train
therapists

18. Cognitive games
 ESCoNS Conference findings – Adam Gazzaley
 Sharp Brains – Fernando Alvarez
 Studies of cognitive improvement with video games
by Daphne Bauvelier
 Randomized controlled trials from Lumosity, Dakim,
and others

19. Dakim Brain Fitness
 UCLA researchers found that older adults who
regularly used a brain fitness program played on a
computer demonstrated significantly improved
memory (immediate and delayed) and language
skills, and stronger attention, focus, and
concentration
 Played three times a week for 20 minutes, on
average, for six months

20. Avatar research for health
 Research finds that avatar experiences can lead
to behavior change by showing cause and effect:
 Avatar eats too much food and becomes fat, then
user eats less in real life
 User runs in place while watching their avatar run
and become thinner…Stop running and avatar
becomes fatter…leads to more exercise in real life
 When you avatar ages, you take care of older
“you”

21. Active games

22. Kinect motion sensing for diagnosis and
therapy, and telerehabilitation
 Flexible Action and Articulated Skeleton Toolkit (FAAST)
(Suma, Lange, Rizzo & Bolas) enables use of Kinect
 Jewel Mine, Mystic Isle, case studies show positive results,
other research in progress
 Features, videos of the new Kinect: http://ow.ly/ltaF7 More articles
listed here: http://ow.ly/ltaTR
 High-end sensors in Kinect technology may revolutionize personal
health and tele-health. Some exciting predictions: http://ow.ly/lsO7g
 Telerehabilitation: 7 products use Kinect to provide physical therapy
online & monitor/save progress. Video demos: http://ow.ly/l62zZ

23. Kinect for pain diagnosis and treatment

24. Sensors, self-tracking in games

25. Thank you!
Debra Lieberman, Ph.D.
Director, Health Games Research National Program
University of California, Santa Barbara
www.healthgamesresearch.org
Twitter: @GamesResearch
Twitter: @DebLieberman
Health Games Research Database
www.healthgamesresearch.org/db