Aniek Wols

303 7 MOTIVATIONAL FACTORS IN A MENTAL HEALTH GAME university program, of which 56.0% studied psychology. Participants indicated to play video games for on average 4.25 hours (SD = 6.77) per week. Almost half of the participants (48.8%) did not play video games at all in an average week, 27.9% indicated playing video games up to 7 hours a week, and 23.3% played video games for more than 7 hours a week. Procedure Participants were recruited through the university’s participant pool system, by handing out flyers at lectures, and by putting up posters/advertisements on campus and on Facebook. The current study consisted of an online screening questionnaire to assess eligibility and – if participants showed elevated mental health symptoms and were unfamiliar with Monument Valley – a subsequent experiment in the lab. In the online screening, participants (n = 648) first read information about the study and gave active consent for the screening prior to filling in the questionnaires. Participants filled out questionnaires regarding demographics, mental health symptoms, motivation to change, mindsets, and video gaming habits. The screening also included filler items on academic performance to disguise the aim of the screening and to avoid demand characteristics. Participants were invited to the lab if they had elevated mental health symptoms (see measures below) and if they were not familiar with the game that was used in the experiment. The online screening took approximately 15 minutes and participants filled out the online screening on a voluntarily basis or in exchange for course credits. Eligible participants (n = 264) were invited to come to the lab within two weeks after filling out the screening questionnaire (range 1 to 20 days, M = 8.15, SD = 4.52). This invitation was accepted by 155 participants who received information about the study set-up and signed informed consent for the experiment. During the experiment, participants first filled out two questions about their mood, and subsequently watched two trailers after which they had to choose one of the games. Although participants believed they had two game options to choose from, both trailers portrayed the same commercial video game (Monument Valley; Ustwo Games, 2014a). The two trailers promoted the game through different graphic design, musical elements, font choice, and editing style, as a mental health or entertainment game. After participants made their choice, they rated the attractiveness and fun of each game based on the trailers and played Monument Valley on a tablet (a 10.1-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab 3, GT-P5210). Participants were free to decide how long they wanted to play the game. To ensure that participants

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