Editorial to the April Issue

This issue contains eight very different contributions, but ones that are each connected to some of the others, through simulation/game type, the area of use, or the technology that is being utilized. This, in my view, is exactly as it should be during our 50th anniversary year. This journal has maintained a position for various types of simulations and games that have a human element in them, from medicine to schools and from board games to virtual realities and features both research articles and simulations ready to use.

The first article, “Does repeated exposure to critical situations in a screen-based simulation improve the self-assessment of non-technical skills in postpartum hemorrhage management?” by Jessy Barré et al. (2019), shows how the use of a medical simulation may decrease the risk of the world’s leading cause of maternal death at childbirth. This task is accomplished by training both leaders and teams to work more efficiently and empathically in such situations.

In the second, “Using a serious game to train violence risk assessment and management skills”, Jonathan Mason and Krystelle Loader (2019) discuss how a game can be utilized to teach people who will be working in health care and human services to become more proficient at assessing the risk of violence. The study showed that learning effects between the game and traditional learning were similar, but the game was found to be more engaging.

The third, “Gaming in virtual reality: What changes in terms of usability, emotional response and sense of presence compared to non-immersive video games?” by Federica Pallavicini, Alessandro Pepe, and Maria Eleonora Minissi (2019), compared the playing of the same game in desktop and virtual reality conditions. Both environments were found as easy to use, but the virtual reality version provided a stronger sense of presence and a more intensive emotional experience.

In the fourth, “Developing a task switching training game for children with a rare genetic syndrome linked to intellectual disability”, Nigel Robb, Annalu Waller, and Kate A. Woodcock (2019) analyzed the use of cognitive task switching that was tested and developed with children who have a genetic syndrome that affects intelligence. Their research explored the way in which skill improvement was seen with those who played the game, as opposed to those who played a control version.

The fifth article, by Bill Roungas, Femke Bekius, and Sebastiaan Meijer (2019) is about game theory and game design, two areas that are often confused with each other by people who are not game researchers, yet rarely seen together. “The game between game theory and gaming simulation: Design choices” combines the two in an analysis of three game design processes, and shows the advantages of applying game theory to the design process.

Margaret Anne Verkuyl, Lorraine Betts, and Suba Sivaramalingam’s article (2019), “Nursing students’ perceptions using an interactive digital simulation table: A usability study”, uses the Technology Acceptance Model to assess the perceived value of a nursing simulation. They found that while the nursing students were pleased with the simulation, they also suggested several significant improvements to it.

The seventh work, “Creating pathways to personal resilience through classroom simulations” by Lorin Walker, Ray Luechtefeld, and Jo Anne Long Walker (2019) shows the increase in students’ ability to recover from adverse experiences, i.e., personal resilience, after courses that included simulations with suitable elements.

The final contribution, again shares a medical or healthcare contexts. In “A virtual-reality training simulator for cochlear implant surgery” Blake Jones et al. (2019) address in the ways in which a Unity3D-based virtual reality system was used to teach the difficult skill of surgically implanting the hearing-assisting device.

We hope you find this diverse collection of articles interesting, engaging, and inspiring.