C-Negotiation Game: An educational game model for construction procurement and negotiation

Abstract

Construction procurement and negotiation is one of the key subjects in construction management education. However, most related courses involve only lectures without engaging students in real cases. Although educational games have been reported to be effective in motivating students\' learning, a limited number of studies have focused on developing a realistic negotiation game as a teaching instrument in a class. We developed a web-based negotiation game, named C-Negotiation Game, for enabling students to make simulated decisions in construction procurement and negotiation processes. The game enables students to play the role of either contractor or supplier, schedule the required procurement, evaluate prospective negotiating parties, conduct parallel negotiations, allocate materials to projects, and manage the cash flow. The game is also equipped with randomization features such as assigning random quality performance levels to different suppliers. An experiment was conducted using 72 participating students, and the results indicated a significant improvement of at least 20.16% in the students\' posttest scores regardless of the pretest scores. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.