Motivation in the learning process and its relationship with gamified activities - an epistemological analysis

Abstract

Motivation is an important factor in human life and very significant in the learning process. Along the development of the philosophical thought that included the visions of man and the conceptions of behavior determination, several compendiums on motivation were written. Many learning theorists have studied or highlighted the role of motivational variables in learning or memory. It is from this perspective that the concept of motivation will be treated in this work, reflecting on the approaches of how motivation in the context of teaching and learning has been characterized over time and to historicize the relationship between historical motivation and gamification as a teaching strategy. The reflections raised in this work point out that among the epistemological and pedagogical models, constructivism and relational pedagogy stand out for favoring the interaction between the subject and the environment. Gamification follows the constructivist epistemological model in which knowledge is not just transmitted and is based on relational pedagogy, valuing the association of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations in the teaching-learning process. Consequently, this work can help the development of research on gamification in the educational field, aiming at the realization of knowledge by joining cognitive assumptions together with the use of rewards.