Dr. Anchal Garg

Background: Digital games are increasingly used for civic purposes, yet questions remain about whether commercially mediated, non-deliberative interactions can constitute meaningful civic engagement. Existing research largely overlooks how entertainment platform infrastructures shape the democratic legitimacy and interpretability of user input at scale. Objectives: This paper investigates whether ambient interactions within commercial games can meaningfully be understood as civic engagement, and under what conditions. Methods: We analyse Play2Act, a climate-focused questionnaire embedded across 24 popular commercial mobile games as part of the GREAT project, which engaged over 181,000 participants from nearly every country. Drawing on civic media, platform studies, and digital participation literatures, we examine the methodological, ethical, and interpretive dimensions of embedding policy-relevant surveys in entertainment environments. The analysis focuses on how civic voice is structured by game design, platform affordances, and datafication logics. Results and Conclusions: Play2Act exemplifies what we term para-civic infrastructure: socio-technical systems that simulate civic input without supporting deliberation or accountability. Without evidence of participant intentionality or comprehension of the civic framing, these data are best understood as ambient civic signals rather than direct expressions of democratic will. We conclude that digital games are valuable diagnostic sites for understanding civic engagement at scale, and call for more dialogic and transparent design in future civic-technological interventions. Lay Summary: What is currently known about this topic? • Digital games are increasingly used to gather public input on political and social issues • Civic engagement online is often assumed to require deliberation, awareness, and intent • Entertainment platforms shape what kinds of participation are possible, yet are rarely examined critically • Large-scale digital participation raises concerns about data quality and democratic legitimacy What does this paper add? • Introduces the concept of para-civic infrastructure to describe systems that simulate civic input without deliberation • Shows that game-embedded surveys can reach vast, globally distributed populations including under-represented groups • Argues that participant intentionality cannot be assumed in commercial gaming contexts • Reframes games as diagnostic sites for studying civic engagement rather than civic tools in themselves Implications for practice and policy • Designers of civic-tech interventions should build in transparency about how data will be used • Policy actors should treat game-derived civic data as ambient signals, not direct democratic mandates • Future platforms should incorporate deliberative or dialogic elements to strengthen legitimacy • Regulatory frameworks may need to address the civic claims made by datafied participation systems

Background: Digital games are increasingly used as tools for civic and societal engagement, particularly to reach younger and digitally literate publics on complex issues such as climate change. While such approaches can facilitate large-scale participation and raise awareness, their capacity to support deliberative forms of civic engagement within real-world policy contexts remains insufficiently examined. Objectives: This study examines whether and how survey-based engagement embedded within a commercial digital game can move beyond surface-level participation toward forms of engagement relevant to policy deliberation. Methods: The paper reports on an exploratory case study (GCS1) conducted within the GREAT project, in which a multiple-choice climate policy survey was embedded into a commercial multiplayer game. The design prioritised scale and accessibility over deliberative depth, enabling large-scale, anonymous data collection from a predominantly young and digitally literate population. Descriptive and inferential analyses were used to examine patterns of engagement and policy preferences across demographic groups. Results and Conclusions: The embedded survey achieved high levels of participation, demonstrating the feasibility of game-based data collection at scale and the potential of games to introduce climate policy issues to digitally engaged publics. However, expressed engagement and policy preferences did not provide evidence of deliberative reasoning, reflecting constraints associated with survey design, platform demographics, and the absence of reflective or dialogic mechanisms. Game-based surveys are therefore best understood as complementary entry points for civic engagement rather than standalone tools for democratic deliberation, highlighting the need to integrate games within broader deliberative and institutional frameworks. Lay Summary: What is currently known about this topic? • Digital games are increasingly used to engage citizens with climate and policy issues. What does this paper add? • This study shows that surveys embedded in a commercial game can reach large audiences but have limited capacity to support reflective policy deliberation. Implications for practice/or policy: • Game-based surveys work best as entry points for engagement when linked to wider deliberative and policy processes.

Discussion Forums are important collaborative spaces to enhance
learning experiences, however, the research shows that they are used
sparingly. Hence, there is a need to design innovative strategies to
promote participation in the Discussion Forums. A Moderator Augmented
Extended Discussion Forum was created based on the Learner-Centric
MOOC Model. The aim of this study is to examine the effect of this
intervention on participation and course completion, as well as identify
the factors influencing forum participation through the extended UTUAT
model. Data was collected from MOOC course logs and a survey. Partial
Least Square-Structural Equation Modelling and Necessary Condition
Analysis were used to determine the intentions to use the Discussion
Forum. The results indicate that usage of the forum was instrumental in
increasing participation and motivation to complete the course.
Subsequently, the results from the extended Unified Theory of
Acceptance and Use of Technology model indicate that Performance
Expectancy, Self-Efficacy, and Discussion Forum uniqueness were the
major factors influencing the Behavioural Intention and Usage
Behaviour. The study concludes that the Augmented Discussion Forum
facilitated peer learning, improved participation, and enhanced learner
performance, thus resulting in better course completion rates. These
findings provide course designers, course instructors, MOOC developers,
peer researchers, and academicians with insights into the optimization
of forums and adoption of learner-centric strategies while designing
Discussion Forums and related activities.

Procrastination is one of the issues affecting more than half of the student population and is known to impact them negatively. It is also one of the major reasons for failure and dropout. Therefore, several studies have been conducted in this domain to understand when and why students procrastinate. The existing studies use self-reported procrastination scales and/or digital traces of student interactions recorded in learning environments to identify procrastination behavior. The majority of the extant studies leverage individual tasks such as assignments submission, quizzes attempted, course materials assessed by a student, etc., to study such behavior.
This paper uses group-based collaborative wiki activity to explore the procrastination behavior among the students. This study will help us explore student behavior in a group activity. The results would help us investigate if the student’s behavior changes when it comes to a group activity. The results would be beneficial for instructors, practitioners, and educational researchers to know if group activity could be utilized to overcome procrastination behavior

Purpose The use of technology in teaching and learning process for children is gaining importance. Children with specific learning disabilities have shown positive results with assistive technology tools. Dyscalculia is a specific learning disability in which an individual faces problem in mathematical skills. Around 3-7% of the world population is affected with it. The aim of the current research study is to determine the effectiveness of an assistive technology tool, Mathlete on children with dyscalculia's early numeracy skills. Such assistive technology tools can serve as a boon for these children. Method A total of 40 children with dyscalculia (M-age = 6.8 years) were a part of the study. The group of 40 children were randomly divided into two groups: experiment group using mathlete for improving their learning (30 children) and a control group using only traditional teaching for learning (10 children). The children were screened for dyscalculia using the screening module of mathlete. Results The two groups showed no significant difference in terms of their socio-economic status, gender and parents education level. Children in the experiment group showed improvement from pre-test to post-test after using mathlete. Also, there was significant difference in learning of both the groups, children in experiment group could understand the concepts better than the ones in control group. Conclusion Mathlete helped improve the mathematical learning of children with dyscalculia from pre-test to post-test.