Online Games for the Next Generation of Workers

The “Next Generation”, “Net Generation”, “digital natives”, “ millennials” o r the “Googl e g eneration”, are some of the names used to de scribe the new generation entering to th e workforce, gro wing u p in a n etworked world and having a d ifferent se t of needs and e xpectations as to learning and train ing. Thus, there is a n eed to find new elearning en vironments th at would en sure the learn ers’ greater motivation and engagement to e-learning courses, in order to avo id high rates of d rop-out. The current research in e-lea rning is focusing it s attention in using innovative environments, s uch as MMOGs (Mas sive Mu ltiplayer Online Game s) and vir tual w orlds as tr aining tools. Thi s paper d ignifies th e n eed for creat ing collab orative educational online games, by presenting the findings of a research which revealed that the strong sense of commu nity that the players b uild i n th e game, in a p opular co mmercial called World of Warcraft (WoW), was linked with high intrinsic motivation and performanc e scores. Thus, t he abilit y to collaborate and form commu nities in a game cou ld trigger cognitive, affective and social aspects of th e player’s behavior. Th is p aper als o p resents an exp anded frame work for creating in trinsic motivation in MMOGs , p roposed by Malone and Lepper, adding the element of sense of community as a support of intrinsic motivation.