得益于信息技术的快速发展，在线学习已经变得越来越便捷而普及。然而，用户退出率居高不下却对这一产业的发展带来了严峻挑战。当前，很大比例的在线学习已不再是组织的强制培训，而是用户的自愿参与行为，于是如何更好地吸引和激励用户成为了一个极其紧迫的问题。在此背景下，许多在线学习平台开始引入游戏化设计，然而这种尝试是否发挥了预期作用却尚未得到有效检验，这也使得平台中游戏化机制的设计和运营缺乏指导。因此，本文聚焦于游戏化设计对在线学习用户行为有何影响这一研究问题，探索排行榜、用户竞争和协作等通用的游戏化设计元素在在线学习平台中的作用，从而既填补了相关理论，又为管理实践带来了启示。基于“需求-可供性-功能特征的视角”，本文从自我决定理论和心理占有理论出发，分析了排行榜和用户竞争对在线学习用户需求的满足情况，进而提出理论假设。本文从一个大型在线学习平台中收集了较大规模的客观数据以构建数据集，倾向得分匹配加双重差分的计量估计结果表明，使用排行榜和用户竞争功能对于用户的在线学习行为均有正面影响。这一研究结果为自愿参与的在线学习平台中游戏化设计的作用提供了有效的实证证据。为进一步探索竞争对用户的影响，本文对体验性结果和工具性结果作了区分。本文发现，竞争的胜负结果会影响用户后续的竞争参与行为，其中胜利比失败更能促进用户参与后续竞争；然而，如果将考虑的重点放在用户后续的学习行为，即工具性结果上，那么对于此前学习努力不足的用户来说，竞争失败能刺激他们在之后付出更多学习努力，而只有对于此前学习努力程度较高的用户，竞争胜利才能对他们后续的学习形成显著的正向影响。基于这一研究发现，本文提出了可以打破零和博弈困境的竞争对手匹配策略。本文进而探究了协作学习机制对在线学习平台中用户行为的影响。基于社会心理学和组织行为学中的相关理论，本文分析了协作学习群体的若干特征，以及用户与群体可能产生的交互对用户学习行为的影响。实证分析结果表明，协作学习群体中的成员数量和平均学习表现对用户学习行为有正向影响；而成员学习表现之间的差异对用户学习行为有负面影响；用户会对他们在群体中排名的变化作出反应，当排名下滑时，他们会付出更多学习努力，但伴随排名提升，其努力水平又将下降。基于这些发现，本文对平台设计和维护协作学习机制给出了指导建议。
Enabled by the rapid development of information technology, online learning has become increasingly more convenient and popular. However, the extremely high drop-out rate is challenging the development of online learning industry. Nowadays, a large percentage of online learning has changed from mandatory training in organizations to learners’ voluntary participation. Hence users’ learning experience and motivation directly determine whether they continue to participate in online learning or directly drop out. To better engage and motivate users, many online learning platforms have introduced gamification design. However, the question that whether gamification design functions as we expect in the online learning platforms is still unanswered. As a result, online learning practitioners lack guidance to effectively design and maintain gamification mechanisms. Therefore, this thesis focuses on the research question that how gamification design affects online learners’ behavior and explores the role of leaderboard, competition, and collaboration in online learning platforms. This study enriches the relevant literature and sheds light on practice.Based on needs-affordances-features (NAF) perspective, we combine self-determination theory and psychological ownership theory to analyze how gamification modules in online learning apps provide motivational affordances to users. Focusing on leaderboard and competition, this thesis proposes hypotheses that both using leaderboard and participating in competitions have a positive effect on users’ online learning behavior. This thesis collects data from a popular online language learning app and construct a large-scale panel dataset. By the econometric analysis of using propensity score matching and difference in difference method, this thesis finds that our hypotheses are supported. This study provides a valid evidence that gamification design does work in the voluntary online learning platforms.In order to have a more systematic and comprehensive understanding of the influence of participating in competition on users, this thesis pays attention to both experiential and instrumental outcomes. This thesis emphasizes not only the impacts of the competitive outcomes, namely, winning and losing, but also the effects of how learners have reached the outcomes. This thesis finds that winning has a positive impact on learners’ subsequent participation in competition, but the impact of losing is less positive. But when it comes to the instrumental outcomes, namely users’ subsequent learning behavior, we find evidence that losing, which is seemingly undesired by all, can promote subsequent learning for learners who have not exerted much effort before. In contrast, the positive effect of winning on subsequent learning only exists for those who have worked hard. Based on the findings, this thesis sheds light on how elearning platforms can design a more effective competitor-matching strategy to save them from a zero-sum game dilemma.This thesis then investigates the effect of collaboration on user behavior in online learning platforms. Drawing on relevant theories in social psychology and organizational behavior, this thesis analyzes how certain characteristics of collaborative learning groups and the interaction between users and groups affect users’ learning behavior. This thesis finds that the social comparison, social norms, the acceptance of norms, the size of group, and the average learning performance in the group have a significantly positive effect on the user’s learning behavior. The variance of learning behavior in the group has a significantly negative effect on the user’s learning behavior. This thesis also finds the evidence that users will react to changes in their ranking within the group. When the rankings decline, they will pay more learning effort; but as the rankings increase, the level of effort will fall. Based on these findings, this thesis provides some suggestions on the design and maintainence of collaboration in the online learning platforms.
