Fostering Mastery and Motivation Without Leaderboards

• Leaderboard Challenges: Leaderboards in educational apps can increase negative emotions and decrease motivation, particularly impacting female students and fostering unhealthy competition.
• Achievement Gap Concerns: Evidence suggests that leaderboards often benefit high achievers, potentially demotivating and discouraging lower-performing students, thus widening the achievement gap.
• Focus on Mastery: Prioritizing individual progress and mastery in educational technology, through personalized adaptation and positive feedback, can support better learning outcomes without the pressure of peer comparison.

The Prevalence of Leaderboards in Gamification

From Fortnite to Candy Crush to Peloton, leaderboards are becoming standard components for gamification. By publicly displaying users' rankings based on various metrics, leaderboards incentivize participants to climb the ranks by outperforming others, driving engagement, motivation, and performance.

Despite their popularity, our app does not include a leaderboard.

Rethinking the Role of Leaderboards in Educational Apps

This may seem like a bad design and marketing decision given the widespread adoption of leaderboards in industries as diverse as health and fitness, customer service, and, of course, education [1]. Indeed, research into leaderboards in education generally and mathematics education more specifically reports positive outcomes such as increases in student attention [2] and improved student performance [3].

The Negative Impact of Leaderboards on Student Performance

However, a significant body of evidence suggests leaderboards can adversely affect students in a variety of ways. Leaderboards have been shown to increase negative emotions and decrease learner motivation [4]. However, the strongest argument against leaderboards is their tendency to make performance competitive, which can adversely affect certain student populations [5].

A study about leaderboards and female students is instructive here [6]. In the study, female participants were exposed to either a male-dominated leaderboard, a female-dominated leaderboard, or no leaderboard. Not only did exposure to the leaderboard not improve their math performance, the study found that participants in the female-dominated leaderboard condition performed comparatively worse on a math quiz. As a result, the research concluded that leaderboards tend to inspire social comparison, leading to negative effects on academic performance, particularly for female students.

Similarly, in a study of the effects of leaderboards in gamified mathematics education, researchers found that leaderboards favor male students significantly more than female students on measures of interest and enjoyment [7].

A meta-analysis of competition in gamified education found that competition typically results in dominance by high achievers, which in turn decreases the participation and performance of low achievers. In other words, competition—intrinsic to the purpose of leaderboards—widens the achievement gap, improving the performance of students already successful in the discipline while simultaneously harming less-able students [8].

Because perceived failure can lead to math anxiety, and math anxiety is negatively correlated with math achievement [9], our approach retrains student’s focus on development. Rather than spotlighting relative performance through comparison on a leaderboard, we choose to focus on individual progress and mastery. Our approach emphasizes personalized adaptation and positive feedback, catering to individual learning trajectories without the pressures of peer comparison.

Our Approach: Focusing on Individual Progress and Mastery

Our decision not to include a leaderboard is not to say that we believe all gamification elements are detrimental. Gamification, when implemented thoughtfully, can serve as a powerful motivator [2] [3] [10]. That is why we include elements such as badges and awards, and customizable avatars to connect with and motivate our students.

Of course, many ed tech apps will continue to use leaderboards and champion their potential to engage and motivate. And there are probably many contexts where that approach makes sense.

However, the essence of any educational technology lies not just in the tool itself but in the pedagogical strategies embedded within it [11]. While gamification can serve as a motivator, its implementation must be thoughtful and aligned with overarching educational goals, ensuring genuine benefits for all students [12].

Prioritizing Individual Growth in Educational Goals

Our goals are simple—to help every student become proficient in math. By focusing on strategies that prioritize individual growth over comparative performance, we aim to create an environment that aligns with the intrinsic needs and motivations of students, ensuring better outcomes in mathematics and beyond.

References

[1] L. C. Amo, R. Liao, H. R. Rao, and G. Walker. (2018). Effects of leaderboards in games on consumer engagement. In SIGMIS-CPR '18, June 18–20, 2018, Buffalo-Niagara Falls, NY, USA, 2 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3209626.3209708

[2] Jaaska, E., Lehtinen, J., Kujala, J., & Kauppila, O. (2022). Game-based learning and students’ motivation in project management education. Project Leadership & Society, 3. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.plas.2022.100055

[3] Recabarren, M., Corvalán, B., & Villegas, M. (2023). Exploring the differences between gamer and non-gamer students in the effects of gamification on their motivation and learning, Interactive Learning Environments, 31(6), 3529-3542. https://doi.org/10.1080/10494820.2021.1933543

[4] Cao, Y., Gong, S-Y, Wang, Z., Cheng, Y., & Wang, Y-Q. (2022). More challenging or more achievable? The impacts of difficulty and dominant goal orientation in leaderboards within educational gamification. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 38, 845-860. https://www.doi.org.10.1111/jcal.12652

[5] Dichev, C., & Dicheva, D. (2017) Gamifying education: what is known, what is believed and what remains uncertain: a critical review. International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education, 14(9). https://doi.org/10.1186/s41239-017-0042-5

[6] Christy, K. R., & Fox, J. (2014). Leaderboards in a virtual classroom: A test of stereotype
threat and social comparison explanations for women's math performance. Computers & Education, 78, 66-77. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2014.05.005

[7] Gurjanow, I., & Ludwig, M. (2017). Gamifying math trails with the MathCityMap App: Impact of points and leaderboard on intrinsic motivation. In Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Technology in Mathematics Teaching (ICTMT 13), Lyon, France, July 3-6, 2017 (pp. 108-115). ictmt13_gurjanow_ludwig.pdf (sciencesconf.org)

[8] Chen, C., Shih, C., & Law, V. (2020). The effects of competition in digital game-based learning(DGBL): A meta-analysis. Educational Technology Research and Development, 68, 1855–1873. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-020-09794-1

[9] Barroso, C, Ganley, C. M., McGraw, A, L., Hart, G, S., & Daucourt, M. C. (2021). A meta-analysis of the relation between math anxiety and math achievement. Psychological Bulletin, 147(2), 134-168. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/bul0000307

[10] Karnes, J., Barwasser, A., & Grünke, M. (2021). The effects of a math racetracks intervention on the single-digit multiplication facts fluency of four struggling elementary school students. Insights into Learning Disabilities 18(1), 53-77. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/348488364_The_Effects_of_a_Math_Racetracks_Intervention_on_the_Single-Digit_Multiplication_Facts_Fluency_of_Four_Struggling_Elementary_School_Students

[11] Fadda, D., Pellegrini, M., Vivanet, G., Callegher, C. Z., (2021). Effects of digital games on student motivation in mathematics: A meta-analysis in K-12. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 38, 304–325. https://www.doi.org/10.1111/jcal.12618

[12] Zhu, Y., Xu, S., Wang, W., Zhang, L., Liu, D., Liu, Z., & Xu, Y. (2022). The impact of Online and Offline Learning motivation on learning performance: the mediating role of positive academic emotion. Education and Information Technologies, 27(7), 8921+.
https://link-gale-com.proxy-ln.researchport.umd.edu/apps/doc/A715923535/AONE?u=loyoland_main&sid=ebsco&xid=ea85e03e