Feb 2, 2015

Directed by our faculty member Dr. Debra Lieberman, the newly established Center for Digital Games Research at UC Santa Barbara studies digital media and games from a multidisciplinary perspective. The focus of the Center is studying the impact of video games — and digital media in general — as well as their boundless potential to engage and entertain in ways that enrich people’s lives. Over 30 faculty affiliates bring a wide range of expertise in areas such as human-computer interaction, virtual environments, simulations, social networks, data mining, interactive storytelling and narrative, media neuroscience, and behavioral health. Supported by seed money from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Center brings together faculty and digital media from a variety of sources.

“UCSB saw an opportunity to continue our work in a way that would include the university’s faculty from many academic disciplines and would bring together their wide range of research and development expertise. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation liked the idea and provided start-up funding to help us establish the center," said Lieberman. “Our research contributes to the evidence-based design of digital media and games to improve their quality and effectiveness and to serve the needs and abilities of end users.” As a lecturer in the Department, her own research is focused on processes of learning, motivation and behavior change with interactive media and games, with special interests in the design of games for health and learning.

The current grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is a follow-up to her 2007 award that established a six-year, $8.25-million national program called Health Games Research at UC Santa Barbara, where Lieberman also served as director. She and her team provided scientific leadership in the emerging health games field and funded 21 research projects across the country that studied the design and effectiveness of health games.

In addition to conducting research and development, the Center for Digital Games Research maintains an online searchable Health Games Database that provides information about hundreds of health games and hundreds of related publications, resources, organizations and events.

Read the full article here: http://www.news.ucsb.edu/2015/014784/games-people-play