多工下的沉浸－重新定義數位遊戲中的沉浸

Abstract

數位遊戲已成為一個重要的休閒活動，儘管遊戲的數量及類型眾多，不同玩家也有自己的偏好，但在玩家間大都共享著一種代表深深地涉入 (involve) 遊戲中，被稱為「沉浸」 (Immersion) 的遊戲經驗。沉浸讓玩遊戲的過程不僅提昇至一種享受，更構成玩家獨一無二的遊戲經驗。 在Brasel與Gips的研究 (2011) 中，讓受試者自由地使用電視和網路三十分鐘。結果顯示在此情況下，受試者評估自己在工作間切換的次數，僅是實際切換次數的百分之十二而已。顯示多工的時候，人們會缺乏切換工作行爲的意識及記憶，多工也需要高度的注意力以及資訊處理能力。而在沉浸經驗中，也會出現類似的情況，需要注意力的集中。 多工下的沉浸有別於以往研究，兩者的結合直覺帶來衝突，但同時似乎蘊含一些可能性。若一玩家邊等公車邊玩手機遊戲，在這樣的情況下，他必須主動地察看週遭環境，注意所要搭的公車是否來了；但同時，他也是集中他的注意力在手機遊戲上。玩家儘管分心去做另一件事（也就是發生多工情況），似乎會有礙沉浸的發生；但觀察玩家行爲卻不盡如此，還是可以很沉浸在遊戲當中。 本研究讓受試者同時進行遊戲和影片兩工作，利用自陳量表及眼動儀進行分析。從結果得知，兩工作的沉浸會因爲投入程度而有所不同，玩家會將沉浸度較高的工作來代表整體經驗。除此之外，還發現多工的切換可以避免單工無聊，有助於沉浸的維持。因此本研究認爲，將兩工作沉浸的分數進行加總，可以用來代表整體沉浸程度。在最後，也從結果提出一些現有研究未考慮的面向，期望爲沉浸研究增添更多發揮空間。

Digital games have became a common pastime for lots of people. Despite of the diversity of games, all gamers share the same game experience called “Immersion”, represented a deep involvement in games. Immersion not only enhances the enjoyment of gaming, but also becomes a unique experience for players. In Brasel and Gips’s study (2011), participants were asked to use computer and television concurrently, multitasking across Internet and television content. Results show that participants had little insight into their switching activity and recalled their switching behavior at an average of only 12 percent of their actual switching rate. This pattern of result demonstrated that people would lose conscious and memory of switching activity under multitasking. People also need intense concentration and working memory to handle this condition, which is a similar situation also occured in immersion. The research of immersion under multitasking is different from previous studies. It is contradictory at the first glance, but seems to be possible in some way. For instance, a player might be playing a mobile game while waiting for a bus. Thus he needs to actively monitor the environment for the arrival of the bus. At the meanwhile, he could still focus on the mobile game. Under this circumstance, the player diverts his attention from the game. Although this could prevent the occurrence of immersion, we can say the player still immersed in the game. In this thesis, we proposed an experiment to investigate if one could fell immersion under multitasking by letting participant play a game and watch a video for a duration. With self-report scale and eye tracking technology, we found that the immersion of two tasks gamer felt had various degrees, depending on gamer’s involvement level. And gamer tended to use the higher one to represent their overall experience. We argue that immersion under multitasking exists and can be defined as the sum of the immersion scores of two tasks. With this new perspective toward immersion, we could do much more than we think on the studies of immersion.