Evidence · Not Hype

Research

Do biology video games actually teach science? We measured it. Players learn more cellular immunology — and feel more confident reading cell biology diagrams — than classmates who play a control game.

Peer-Reviewed Publications

2014

Immune Attack players perform better on a test of cellular immunology and self confidence than their classmates who play a control video game.

We asked whether players answer molecular biology and cell biology questions better or worse than classmates who did not play, and whether students who played Immune Attack felt as confident about their ability to understand cell biology diagrams.

Get the paper One-page summary (PDF)

2011

Students Designing Video Games about Immunology: Insights for Science Learning.

High school students learning programming in a Washington, DC summer class showed interest in molecular and cellular biology. Melanie Stegman acted as a scientist requesting a game about neurons and answered student questions. Neda Khalili interviewed students, read their journals and analyzed their final games — finding high engagement with the scientist and high confidence with the material.

Melanie Stegman 2018 Resume (PDF)

Other Publications

National Academies of Science. Envisioning the Future of Health Professional Education: Workshop Summary, 2015. Section on games.
American Society of Cell Biology (ASCB) Annual Meeting, 2015. Poster P835.

Videos

Melanie Stegman presents Immune Defense at the Seattle IGDA meeting, December 2014

Melanie Stegman, Molecular Jig Games — BaltiVirtual Pitch (2018 business plan)

Invited & Other Presentations

2015

Invited speaker, the Koshland Museum of Science, STEM/STEAM Game Community Event, Washington, DC. A 15-minute summary of my research and goals for a general audience. Slides on SlideShare · Watch the talk

2014

IGDA Seattle monthly meeting — How to evaluate intuitive learning that occurs in a video game: using intuitive learning as a marker for success in science learning game development. (Video below.)
Center for Research and Interdisciplinarity, Paris, France. Mentor for the Leadership Program — how games can teach concepts that are complex and require an intuitive understanding.
National Institutes of Health, "Got Game?" Conference on games in biomedical science research and education, Washington, DC. Games have an extremely positive impact on learning and health.
Molecular Simulations and Visualizations, Faraday Discussion 169, Royal Society of Chemistry, Nottingham, England. Presented my peer-reviewed paper on high school students who played Immune Attack.

2013

Serious Play, Seattle, WA.

2012

eTech Ohio, annual conference.
Association of Medical Illustrators (AMI) conference, Toronto, Canada. Using games to introduce a wider audience to the wealth of detail available about molecular biology. Medical illustrators bring science to the public with no metaphors — all data and beauty.
Society for Scholarly Publishing, annual conference. Games as novel ways to present and engage an audience with data.

2011

Technologies in Education Forum, The Atlantic (see minute 32). Panel with leaders in the educational game space.
Games in Science Education, Rice University, organized by Leslie Miller, Ph.D. at The Center for Technology in Teaching and Learning.
Microcomputers in Education, Arizona. Invited by Debbie Kovesdy, whose GenYes students are Immune Defense beta testers.

2010

TV news report (video) by the American Institute of Physics explaining how Immune Attack teaches.
Games, Learning and Society — Immune Attack learning data, with conclusions that shaped Immune Defense.
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) — evidence for learning and confidence gained by players.
Integrating Science Content into Video Game Design, EDMEDIA. Neda Khalili, Asia Williams, Kevin Clark & Kimberly Sheridan (George Mason University) and Melanie Stegman.

2009

First talk at FAS about using video games to teach biology: Immune Attack – The Concept.
American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) annual meeting poster on learning and confidence gained by students playing Immune Attack. Stegman, M.A. (2009). Immune Attack, a Video Game in the Molecular World. Mol. Biol. Cell 20 (suppl), 2356.

See the research in action

Want to help or hear more? Contact Melanie at MolecularJig.com.

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