A Descriptive Analysis of the Literature on Educational Games Published Between 1965 and 2019

Abstract

In the present study, the studies conducted on educational games between 1965 and 2019 were analyzed to determine the trends in research based on the year of publication, topic, publication type, country, target audience and the concepts included in the study title. In the study, 7141 studies that were accessed with "educational games" keyword on the ERIC (Education Resources Information Center) database were analyzed. The abstract data were classified by a software developed by the authors for analysis and the analysis was conducted in two stages. First, the studies on educational games were examined as a group, and then the most studied topics were analyzed separately. The study findings demonstrated that the number of studies on educational games was the highest in 2016 and the prominent topics included instructional methods, learning activities, simulations, and classroom activities. It was determined that digital games were investigated as a type of educational games extensively in studies conducted since 2000, the major type of publication was journal articles, and Australia was the leading country in publications. It was determined that practitioners were the major audience until 2000, and the studies on teachers were prominent since. It was determined that the most frequent concepts in study titles included learning, instruction, simulation, school, game-based, design, computer, science, and mathematics and games, respectively.