Aniek Wols

5 237 THE EFFECT OF EXPECTATIONS IN AN APPLIED GAME of moisture or perspiration on the surface of the skin), to have an objective indicator of arousal complementing the self-reported measures. METHODS Participants Participants were 57 psychology students, who were between 17 and 21 years old, primarily Caucasian, and indicated to be moderately experienced with playing video games (see Table 1 for descriptives). All participants were preselected on elevated levels of anxiety (see preregistration). The Queen's University Health Sciences & Affiliated Teaching Hospitals Research Ethics Board (HSREB) granted ethics approval for the current study (code number: 6019310 PSYC-187-16). Procedure Participants signed informed consent and filled out a questionnaire measuring demographics, anxiety symptoms, and motivation to change. After that, participants viewed a neutral video to measure their baseline GSR (Biopac Systems Inc., 2007) and completed a questionnaire measuring their stateanxiety, affect and arousal. Next, participants viewed a mental health or an entertainment trailer and played MindLight for 60 minutes on a 15.6 inch laptop. After having played the game, participants again filled out questions about their state-anxiety, affect, and arousal, as well as questions about their experiences with the game and questions related to the manipulation checks. MindLight and Experimental Manipulation MindLight is a 3D neurofeedback game designed to reduce anxiety symptoms among youth (GainPlay Studio, 2014; PlayNice Institute, 2014). In the game, Little Arty (the player) needs to save his grandma who succumbed to evil forces. He finds a magical hat that teaches him (and the player) how to use his “mindlight”, a beam of light coming from the antenna attached to the magical hat. The mindlight is controlled via the one-channel dry-sensor electroencephalogram (EEG) headset that the player wears (Neurosky Inc., 2011) and which responds to the real-time relaxation of the player (neurofeedback training; Price & Budzynski, 2009): when the player becomes more relaxed, the light becomes brighter providing more light in the game environment, and making it possible to chase away or uncover “fear events” (exposure training; Feske & Chambless, 1995) and effectively engage with the puzzles (attention

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