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A Serious Game for Introducing Software Engineering Ethics to University Students

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The Challenges of the Digital Transformation in Education (ICL 2018)

Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 916))

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Abstract

This paper presents a game based on storytelling, in which the players are faced with ethical dilemmas related to software engineering specific issues. The players’ choices have consequences on how the story unfolds and could lead to various alternative endings. This Ethics Game was used as a tool to mediate the learning activity and it was evaluated by 144 students during a Software Engineering Course on the 2017–2018 academic year. This evaluation was based on a within-subject pre-post design methodology and provided insights on the students learning gain (academic performance), as well as on the students’ perceived educational experience. In addition, it provided the results of the students’ usability evaluation of the Ethics Game. The results indicated that the students did improve their knowledge about software engineering ethics by playing this game. Also, they considered this game to be a useful educational tool and of high usability. Female students had statistically significant higher knowledge gain and higher evaluation scores than male students, while no statistically significant differences were measured in groups based on the year of study.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://www.episodeinteractive.com/.

  2. 2.

    https://www.episodeinteractive.com/s/6429627363229696.

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Acknowledgment

The authors would like to thank the 144 students that participated in this study and helped us with their comments.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Computer Engineering and Informatics Department, Patras University, Patras, Greece

    Michalis Xenos & Vasiliki Velli

Authors
  1. Michalis Xenos
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  2. Vasiliki Velli
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michalis Xenos .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Carinthia University of Applied Sciences , Villach, Kärnten, Austria

    Michael E. Auer

  2. Department of Informatics, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece

    Thrasyvoulos Tsiatsos

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Xenos, M., Velli, V. (2020). A Serious Game for Introducing Software Engineering Ethics to University Students. In: Auer, M., Tsiatsos, T. (eds) The Challenges of the Digital Transformation in Education. ICL 2018. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 916. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11932-4_55

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