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| Title | Profile-Driven Adaptive Gamification in CS1: Design and Preliminary Evaluation of an Intelligent Personalized System |
| Authors | Matias Torrealba, Francisco Gutierrez, Julita Vassileva |
| Publication date | 2026 |
| Abstract | Introductory programming courses (CS1) suffer from high failure and dropout rates, making motivation a central concern. Gamification has been widely used to address this issue, but most systems apply a uniform "one-size-fits-all" design that overlooks individual differences in motivational orientations. Although player-type models such as HEXAD offer a strong foundation for personalizing gamification, their application in CS1 remains limited. In this paper, we present PAGE (Personalized Adaptive Gamified Environment), an intelligent gamified virtual judge that supports the development of programming skills in CS1. The novelty of our approach is that the system explicitly introduces personalized gamification elements to promote student engagement. These triggers are intelligently adapted, based on the students' HEXAD motivational profiles. We report a preliminary evaluation of N=27 students assigned to three profile-based conditions: Achiever, Player, and a control group over an 11-week semester. Personalized groups showed higher submission, progress, and persistence than the control group, although differences were not statistically significant given the small sample size. Players showed the strongest and most consistent engagement across behavioral and temporal measures. These findings provide preliminary evidence that profile-driven adaptive gamification can positively influence student engagement in CS1. |
| Pages | 1-8 |
| Conference name | IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Systems |
| Publisher | IEEE Computer Society Press (Los Alamitos, CA, USA) |
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