mp2022: Meaningful Play 2022 Michigan State University East Lansing, MI, United States, October 12-14, 2022 |
Conference website | http://meaningfulplay.msu.edu |
Submission link | https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=mp2022 |
Submission deadline | June 26, 2022 |
Meaningful Play 2022 Call for Proposals
October 12th to 14th, 2022 at the Michigan State University campus in East Lansing
Conference Overview
Whether designed to entertain or to achieve more "serious" purposes, games, virtual reality, augmented reality, and mixed reality have the potential to impact players' beliefs, knowledge, attitudes, emotions, cognitive abilities, physical and mental health, and behavior.
Meaningful Play 2022 is a conference about theory, research, and game design innovations, principles and practices. Meaningful Play brings scholars and industry professionals together to understand and improve upon games to entertain, inform, educate, and persuade in meaningful ways.
The conference will include thought-provoking keynotes from leaders in academia and industry, peer-reviewed paper presentations, panel sessions (including academic and industry discussions), innovative workshops, roundtable discussions, and exhibitions of games and prototypes.
Conference Format: In person
Meaningful Play 2022 is scheduled to be held in-person only. We understand that the pandemic has created uncertainty around large-group events like this one. At the same time, our community has sent us a strong signal that they would prefer an in-person conference and the benefits that entails (e.g., live demos, social connections, in-person events). To mitigate the uncertainty as much as possible, we commit to regularly communicating with you about our conference format plans and any potential changes (e.g., switching to virtual if necessitated by COVID). We are also offering a flexible cancellation policy (see Important Dates).
Please note that we will enforce MSU’s current and future COVID policies, such as face-mask requirements for all individuals in MSU indoor facilities regardless of vaccination status. If these policies change, we will ask attendees to adhere to any MSU requirements. Also, regardless of MSU policy, we may still require face masks during the event in order to minimize the risk to our attendees.
Conference Themes
The three primary themes of the conference are:
- exploring meaningful applications of games
- issues in designing meaningful play
- learning, education & games
Call for Submissions
Submissions are sought from both researchers and practitioners in academia and industry. Graduate students are also encouraged to submit either jointly with an academic/member of industry or alone.
Submissions to Meaningful Play 2022 may include:
- Papers
- Posters
- Panel Sessions
- Roundtable Discussions
- Workshops
- Microtalks
- Individual Speakers
- Games and Prototypes
Specific requirements for each type of submission is available below.
Paper Submissions
Paper submissions should present original, unpublished research or design work. Papers under review elsewhere must not be submitted to Meaningful Play 2022.
Authors are encouraged to go beyond the discussion of their work and address implications back to literature, practice, and/or policy.
Authors of accepted papers are expected to present their work at the conference in an approximately 15-minute presentation depending on how many papers are scheduled for that session. The organizing committee will combine individual presentations into topical paper sessions.
Submissions will undergo a blind peer-review process. Authors will be provided with reviewers' critical comments as well as any suggestions for revision. All accepted submissions will have their short non-archival abstracts included in the online conference Proceedings of Meaningful Play after the conference. Note that full papers will not appear in the proceedings and there will be no option for journal publication associated with the conference this cycle.
Authors may submit either a full paper (maximum 8000 words not including a required short abstract of 150 words max) or extended abstract (500 - 1500 words, not including a required short abstract of 150 words) submitted electronically in Microsoft Word format. In order to be considered, full papers must follow APA 7th edition format.
Poster Submissions
Poster submissions should present original, unpublished research or design work that directly advances the Meaningful Play 2022 topics. Late-breaking advances and work-in-progress reports from ongoing research or design are particularly encouraged to be submitted to the poster session.
Authors are requested to submit either a 150-500 word abstract of the poster contents OR a draft version of the poster. Submissions will undergo a blind peer-review process.
Poster size and design are flexible but the size should not exceed 40" wide by 32" high. It is possible to rotate the orientation if necessary given your poster design. Posters will be hung on a poster board and therefore it is fine to bring a poster with no backing, such as a rolled up poster.
Panel Session Submissions
Individuals (or groups of individuals) are encouraged to submit proposals for panel sessions which provide an opportunity to publicly debate and discuss issues with eager academic and industry audiences. Panel session organizer(s) are required to submit a 150-500 word abstract which describes how 3 to 5 panelists will contribute to the debate as well as the panelists experience/credentials as related to the topic of debate. NOTE: This category will be unblinded for review.
Roundtable Discussion Session Submissions
Individuals (or groups of individuals) are encouraged to submit proposals for roundtable discussion sessions. At Meaningful Play 2022 roundtables are small peer discussion groups led by a facilitator (the submitter). Roundtable discussion sessions typically feature constructive controversy and debate amongst the attendees, and promote an open-ended exchange of ideas in a relatively casual setting. Roundtable discussion session organizer(s) are required to submit a 150-500 word abstract which describes the topic, the submitter’s plans for facilitating the conversation, and the submitter’s experience/credentials as a facilitator (e.g., classroom teaching experience). NOTE: This category will be unblinded for review.
Workshop Submissions
Individuals (or groups of individuals) are encouraged to submit proposals for workshops. At Meaningful Play 2022, workshops are sessions conducted in a highly hands-on fashion. Workshop sessions can be 1-2 hours in duration. Depending on the nature of each workshop, the number of attendees may be limited accordingly.
Workshop organizer(s) are required to submit a 150-500 word abstract that describes the topics covered, the target/intended audience, the core concepts/skills that attendees will gain, and the facilitator’s experience/credentials as related to the topic of the proposed workshop. NOTE: This category will be unblinded for review.
Microtalk Submissions
Individuals are encouraged to submit proposals for microtalks (roughly 15 minutes in length) which discuss any of the subtopics listed below. Microtalks will be combined into topical sessions. Microtalk speakers are required to submit a 200-500 word abstract describing their project as well as their relevant experience/credentials. NOTE: This category will be unblinded for review.
- Microtalk Submission Categories
- Game Design Post Mortem — Describe your game design project.
- Theoretical Well-Played — Use a theory from our field to describe a game of interest.
- Meaningful Failures — Describe a research or design project that failed and why.
- Design Principles — Describe a design principle and why it is awesome.
- Game Production Studios — What makes some aspect of your studio special or unique, such as facilities, business model, team, toolset, or pipeline?
- University Program — What makes some aspect of your university program special or unique?
Individual Speaker Submissions
Individuals are encouraged to submit proposals for individual talks. At Meaningful Play, individual speaker sessions are roughly an hour in length, and explore a specific topic or theme in depth, while providing a strong personal or visionary perspective. Individual speakers are required to submit a 150-500 word abstract describing the talk as well as the speaker’s experience/credentials as related to the topic of the talk.
Games and Prototypes
View the game exhibition and competition for details on submitting games and prototypes.
Conference Submission Topics
While any topic related to games for entertainment and learning is appropriate for submission to Meaningful Play, topics of particular interest include:
- Exploring meaningful applications of games
- Games to change attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors
- Games for health
- Social impact games
- Games to stimulate creativity or innovation
- Games to build social skills
- Games to advertise and persuade
- Games to exercise specific cognitive functions
- Games to explore personal beliefs and help make decisions
- Games to build knowledge and skills (games for learning)
- Serious games for history and cultural heritage learning
- Games to promote civic, social, and humanitarian organization and participation
- Spectatorship, eSports, and streaming
- Issues in designing meaningful play
- Game design for specific audience segments
- Player types and play styles
- Story and storytelling in games
- Diversity in games (gender, race, sexuality, etc.)
- Characters and avatars in games
- Competitive and cooperative play (single player, multiplayer and massively multiplayer)
- Balancing entertainment and serious goals
- Repurposing entertainment games for serious purposes (and vice versa)
- Unintended and unexpected effects of games
- Using psychology and neuroscience to design and understand games
- Emerging design research methods to help create better games
- Measuring game impacts
- Innovative techniques and technologies for the design of meaningful play (e.g. game mechanics, reward systems, and user interfaces)
- Gamification
- Virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality
- Learning, Education & Games
- Demonstrations of game technology or design frameworks that are grounded in pedagogy
- Research on games that support empathy and inclusion in education
- Co-creating games, art and technology with students
- Civic engagement and citizenship education through games
- Practicing skills through games, such as media literacy, STEM, argumentation, or writing
- Humanistic education through games