Is gamification the same as competition?

Question

Gamification is thus defined:

is the strategy of interaction between people and companies based on offering incentives that stimulate public engagement with brands in a playful manner. Source

In fact this concept in software construction is increasingly present:

• Stackexchange promotes you with medals, votes, points, privileges in all your communities;
• the Duolingo with scores and rankings.

This proves the direct relationship of gamification to competition as a form of engagement.

What differs gamification from competition in order to captivate an audience?

Answer 1

Not always. Making playful through competition is one of the options available. To be honest, I’m competitive, so I’m easily hooked on this lure.

If in the gamification chosen the points system is not opened, then there will be no external competition. It will be just you and the point going up in the system.

The same thought goes for Badges.

A non-competitive system (by nature pure competition) is the positive vote scheme here in the SE network for questions. Purely, it is a system of feedback in a social game to know if your interaction was well-liked or not. Orkut’s good old karma wasn’t competitive either, although it was a gamified score.

Examples of non-competitive gamification

• quests: some kind of limited-time interaction, leading to reward
• votes: the voting system in a social game by itself is not a direct factor to competition, especially when it is not placed as counterpoint
  • here in the SE network, the voting system in question I see as uncompetitive, already those of answers... who does not dream of having an answer more well accepted than one of Maniero? ;-)
• achievements/Badges/private score: if you don’t see the achievements of other people, as you will try to compete with them?
• combo: from the same example Duolingo, you can make a combo of studying as many consecutive days
• reward/points: no Landing.Jobs, You get reward if I’m not mistaken by the indication that generated hiring. Monetary. In other systems the reward is more timid and abstract, as arbitrary points
• progress bar: the progress viewer himself of how much you wrote on Linkedin about yourself; who in good conscience would not want a 100%?

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I just saw a real example of uncompetitive gamification. It was put as a question here on the site: How to improve this algorithm?

In this example, there is no competition. Some will say that knowing how to divide to win cookies is a conditioning based on Skinner’s techniques, but in the view of the player (the niece of the cookie-eating AP) this is a game.

Answer 2

TL;DR

Gamification is the same thing as competition?

Definitely these concepts are not the same thing. Competition is an element that can be used in a gamified process, but it is not the only interesting or necessary element.

Gamification

One of the first studies of gamification in a scientific way was conducted by Deterding et al. in 2011 (the term came into fashion around 2010). For these authors, the definition of gamification is:

Gamification is the use of elements of game design in contexts that are not games.

Free translation of the English original: Gamification is the use of game design Elements in non-game contexts.

This means that we can use techniques and tools traditionally used to build games in the design of any product (software or not) whose intention primary not entertainment. And why would anyone do that? Because, unlike that piece of code you have executed and it obeys, humans need to be motivated to act in some way - and the fun is a great intrinsic motivator (by intrinsic understand that it does not depend on obvious external benefits like money, food, promise of future earnings, etc).

Okay, but what about the competition?

Turns out this is a complex issue. The very definition of gamification has a very nebulous boundary, mainly because defining what is game is also difficult (if you are interested, read about the feud between Narratologists and Ludologists). I like the definition of Deterding et al. mainly when it is considered along with the work of Fullerton:

The image above is based on the two works cited. Deterding et al. ’s idea is that there are two axes that define the different types of products/tasks that use game design techniques. The horizontal axis, called "All-part", indicates whether the product/task is considered as a whole (i.e., as something unique or monologue) or in parts (i.e., composed of smaller things or activities). The vertical axis, called "Play-Play", indicates the user’s intention when using the product or performing the task.

Fullerton’s contribution to the detailing of the vertical axis demonstrates that the level of interaction helps further in this classification: the interaction does not just involve touching and moving, but also cognitive effort needed to recognize a goal and plan the actions necessary to achieve it. Thus, the more interaction is needed, the closer a product/task is to a game; the less interaction, the closer it is to a mere narrative (a book, a film or a play, for example).

Of course this definition is debatable, but it seems useful to me to understand that Gamification is about using these design concepts to intimately build tasks composed of several parts, but that have not only a goal as a condition of victory (important from the point of view of the user). Another clear thing in this definition is that a gamified process is quite distinct from a game for entertainment, and also from a "serious game": a game (a "Whole" product) that is used for a purpose other than mere entertainment (as, for example, when Wii Motion are used to help in physical therapy).

Competition can be part of any of these types of products, even in toys/games. Even without having a goal or win condition, a joke can still involve competition in other aspects, such as having the cutest toy (see any interaction with toys between the characters Keys and Quico on TV) or be the most able to detail the narrative or fantasy involved in the play.

Anyway, adding medals and scoring lists is only interesting if the user perceives this as something valuable to him, and - mainly - if he can compare his score with other users to experience emotions related to the competition (as was well placed by the accepted answer).

But then what’s beyond the Competition?

The complexity of the subject does not stop in the definition of what is game. It is also difficult to define what is fun and what produces it. Competition is certainly an important element in fun because it involves challenges (opportunities for action that allow a difficult but feasible goal to be achieved), but it is not the only element, nor is it always necessary. This character is one of the easiest to measure in a game. For example, in a racing game I could measure the number of times the player has hit the car or been delayed, and use this "utilitarian" measure to try to find out if the player is being able to compete or not. If I were to conclude that he’s doing extremely badly in the competition, could I infer that he’s not having fun? That question has been asked by many people, and the answer seems to be nay. After all, the player may be hitting the car on purpose, taking advantage of the ride and dazzled by the graphic effects of the beats, so that if asked maybe he said he was having a lot of fun!

Finally, there are many other aspects that are important beyond the challenge (related to the competition). There are hundreds of studies, but Malone, for example, it states that the important aspects are Challenge (clear action opportunities and objectives), Curiosity (new and different sensory information, but not completely chaotic) and Fantasy (mental images that help to understand the real or fictional world). The one MDA model (one of the most known references in the area) has already evolved this into other aspects, including the social aspect, exploration (of the world and the self), and even the mere effort to spend time (which the authors called "submission").

But, you want to have a well summarized (and fantastic) view of what is really "at stake" (Pun intended) beyond the competition? Then gives a studied in another model called The 4 Keys 2 Fun, of Nicole Lazzaro. Next I reproduce the image of Nicole’s model (the rights are all from the author, I reproduce here at fair use only with the intention of disseminating the author’s knowledge and work, which is freely accessible on the website referenced above). It is worth a lot to also access the author’s blog, read her works and, mainly, watch your talk at TED Talks.

As you will notice, this model indicates that competition (which involves the quest to win challenges, whether alone - against oneself - or in a group - against others) is only part of the fun. There is also the social aspect (interacting with other people, creating affective bonds, and spending time with friends), the curiosity aspect (allowing the exploration of fantasies and the satisfaction of the imagination) and the purpose aspect (thinking, feeling and behaving in a way that makes a difference in the world and in other people’s lives).

In your question you say:

"This proves the direct relationship of gamification to competition as form of engagement"

I’d say that proves that competition has its function. In addition to motivating certain types of people to compete, Stackoverflow votes also have a character stigmatic by making content with more votes (positive or negative) attract more and more attention and consequently tend to gain more votes. However, a website or a website that should be gamified should also seek other aspects for people’s motivation, exploring their emotions also with social ties, with curious visual and sound elements, and so on.