Development and validation of the Game Perceptions Scale (GPS)

Despite the pervasiveness of perception and considerable impact of perception on the use of ICT for educational purposes, there is a surprising paucity of perception assessment instruments. The present proposal expands on this through the development and initial validation of the Game Perception Scale (GPS). Based on perception literature, perception is defined as (1) students' expectations about the goals of the environment and (2) the degree to which a student believes that using game based learning environments will enhance his or her performance on which the game based learning environment focuses. In a first study, the exploratory factor analyses revealed a meaningful two-factor solution, which reflects the two dimensions that constitute the notion of game perceptions. Further, we used a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to validate and confirm the model. Cross-validation was repeated in second part of this article in which a large sample was used to perform multi group CFAs. The results showed that GPS can be used in different target groups when researchers want to measure students' perceptions of gamebased learning environments for both pro- and retrospective purposes. However, significant differences in structural relations with respect to the covariance and the variance of the perceived use and perceived goal subscale were found for all the groups.