Welcome to Media Matters - What's our research about?
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Young people [e.g., school-aged kids and adolescents] spend about as much time engaged with media [e.g., scrolling social media, playing video games] as they do in school. What's the appeal? While it's temping to say "mindless scroll" or "zone-out-gaming", that's not our take. We see social media as a radically accessible informal learning environment where adolescents are going to seek knowledge and build community. And we see gaming as active play where gamers engage with important cultural artifacts, flex particular social and cognitive skills, simulate alternative ways of being, and even learn concepts that shape their beliefs.
The Media Matters lab takes these informal learning moments seriously. We study the design of social media and serious games so that we can deliberately craft games and content that can stimulate meaningful engagements. Our goal is to establish an evidence-based design formula and to get creating!
Reality Curated
Reality Curated
Our social media research is rooted in the observation that, whereas #Psychologyfacts proliferate in social media, most of the content that circulates sites like Instagram and TikTok does not accurately represent the field. For more on our mapping of the Psychology-Social-Media-Landscape, Click here
Design to the Max[imal]
Design to the Max[imal]
Our "Reality-Curated" research line shines a light on #Psychologyfacts' popularity. We are heartened that accurate psychology facts get significantly more likes and we want to add more accurate content to the mix of what's out there to be discovered. In our "Design to the Max" research line we are experimentally examining how design principles influence what's learned from a scroll, and whether existing beliefs can change in brief content encounters. For more on what we are learning about how design impacts informal learning through scrolls and views, click here .
Serious Games: Design & Assessment
Serious Games: Design & Assessment
Playful learning opportunities are imperative in childhood, but playful learning can occur at any age. This is the spirit in which the “Games for Change” social movement is situated. If play and games are for learning cultural competencies, then games can be leveraged to promote desired social-cultural changes. Following, we view serious games as culturally situated Wise Interventions. For more on our game design and assessment research line, Click here.
Meet the team
Meet the team
The Media Matters lab is comprised of a vibrant and dedicated group of undergraduates. Click here for more about the people behind the process.
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