Effects of integrating a role-playing game into a virtual reality-based learning approach on students' perceptions of immersion, self-efficacy, learning motivation and achievements

Virtual contexts play a crucial role in assisting students' learning. Researchers have taken advantage of the potential of immersive virtual reality (VR) for situating students in inaccessible places, and for engaging them in learning activities. Meanwhile, several previous studies have reported that, in VR-based learning contexts, students' perception of immersion and learning motivation could be low owing to the lack of clear objectives and problem-solving scenarios. On the other hand, digital game-based learning is capable of enhancing students' engagement in a task. In this study, we designed a learning approach (namely RPG-VR) by means of integrating a role-playing game with VR technology to enhance students' science learning. Furthermore, a quasi-experiment was conducted to evaluate the students' learning effectiveness via, respectively, providing the RPG-VR learning approach and the conventional VR (called C-VR) learning approach for the experimental and control groups. The experimental results indicated that this approach significantly enhanced the students' perceptions of immersion, self-efficacy and extrinsic learning motivation, in comparison with the C-VR learning approach. Specifically, students who learned with the RPG-VR learning approach perceived more immersion in the engagement and the total immersion stages. This study contributes to existing knowledge of VR technology by providing that a digital role-playing game could reinforce the main characteristics of VR-based learning environments and enhance students' concentration on a learning task. However, no significant difference was found between the two groups in terms of promoting students' learning achievements, implying that more instructional assistance is needed to improve students' knowledge gains in VR-based learning environments.

Practitioner notes

What is already known about this topic

• Virtual contexts play a crucial role in promoting students' learning performances.
• Virtual reality has been adopted for situating students in inaccessible places to promote their learning.
• A DGBL context provides students with opportunities for learning that emphasize immersion in practice, resulting in concept acquisition and skill development.

What this paper adds

• An RPG-VR learning approach was designed by means of integrating a role-playing game with VR technology to enhance students' science learning.
• A virtual reality learning system with a role-playing game was developed based on the proposed approach.
• This approach significantly enhanced the students' perceptions of self-efficacy, extrinsic learning motivation and immersion, especially in the engagement and the total immersion stages.
• A digital role-playing game could reinforce the main characteristics of VR-based learning environments.

Implications for practice and/or policy

• The RPG-VR learning approach could be a notable reference for further research on VR-based learning environments.
• More instructional assistance is needed to improve students' knowledge gains in VR-based learning environments.