Pre-test influences on the effectiveness of digital-game based learning: A case study of a fire safety game

When the administration of a pre-test influences the control group's receptivity to the intervention, but not that of the experimental group, results of an effectiveness study may be biased. Hence comparison of post-test scores of different treatments in pre-test/post-test designs may be problematic. This is an important finding in the context of DGBL effectiveness research as the presence of a pre-test may artificially inflate the learning outcomes of the control condition. Therefore, further research should take this into account and look for possible solutions to solve this discrepancy. However, in the present study, we were able to show that the game was highly effective, as both game groups still outperformed the slide-based group that received a pre-test. The Solomon four group design has thus shown its added value and more effectiveness studies on DGBL implementing this design are required in order to further validate these results.