Applying Aspects of the Expert Performance Approach to Better Understand the Structure of Skill and Mechanisms of Skill Acquisition in Video Games. (20th November 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Boot, Walter R.; Sumner, Anna; Towne, Tyler J.; Rodriguez, Paola; Anders Ericsson, K.
• Is Part Of: Topics in cognitive science. Volume 9:Number 2(2017:Apr.)
• Page Start: 413
• Page End: 436
• Publication Date: 2016-11-20
• Subjects: Video games -- Expertise -- Skill acquisition -- Verbal protocols -- Expert Performance Approach -- Space Fortress; Cognitive science -- Periodicals; Cognitive Science -- Periodicals; 153.05
• DOI: 10.1111/tops.12230
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1756-8757

Abstract

Abstract: Video games are ideal platforms for the study of skill acquisition for a variety of reasons. However, our understanding of the development of skill and the cognitive representations that support skilled performance can be limited by a focus on game scores. We present an alternative approach to the study of skill acquisition in video games based on the tools of the Expert Performance Approach. Our investigation was motivated by a detailed analysis of the behaviors responsible for the superior performance of one of the highest scoring players of the video game Space Fortress (Towne, Boot, & Ericsson, 2016 ). This analysis revealed how certain behaviors contributed to his exceptional performance. In this study, we recruited a participant for a similar training regimen, but we collected concurrent and retrospective verbal protocol data throughout training. Protocol analysis revealed insights into strategies, errors, mental representations, and shifting game priorities. We argue that these insights into the developing representations that guided skilled performance could only easily have been derived from the tools of the Expert Performance Approach. We propose that the described approach could be applied to understand performance and skill acquisition in many different video games (and other short‐ to medium‐term skill acquisition paradigms) and help reveal mechanisms of transfer from gameplay to other measures of laboratory and real‐world performance. Abstract : The authors use a modified think‐aloud (TAL) procedure to collect 20 hours of longitudinal data from one player as he acquires expertise in the game Space Fortress. The insights into player exploration and invention of new methods is extraordinary and could only have been obtained via this modified version of the Expert Performance Approach to dynamic skill acquisition.