HealthyMindEd and the Barcelona School of New Technologies join forces to promote university digital well-being through the creation of a “Serious Game”
by Anna Muro-Rodriguez, Òscar Garcia-Pañella, Adrià Díaz, Alejandro Garcia, Ivan Bonilla & Ramon Cladellas
Group of Studies in Healthy and Sustainable Human Development
BARCELONA – 9 April 2024 – The European project HealthyMindEd has today launched a strategic collaboration with the School of New Interactive Technologies of the University of Barcelona (ENTI) for the development of serious games. A serious game is an interactive video game or application specifically designed for training, educational, therapeutic or awareness-raising purposes, rather than seeking entertainment alone. They use game mechanics to teach skills, simulate real situations or improve learning. This initiative seeks to provide university students with gamified interactive tools that help them manage their digital well-being in an increasingly tech-savvy academic environment. The HealthyMindEd project (KA220-HED), funded by the European Union through the Erasmus+ Cooperation in Higher Education program, started in November 2024 and has brought together the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU; Germany), the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), the University of Warwick (United Kingdom) and the Media & Learning association (M&L, Belgium) to analyze and disseminate the impact of digitalization on the mental and social health of the university academic community (both teachers and students) and propose concrete solutions that will be included in a guide to good practices and policies for universities of the European Union.
A cutting-edge academic collaboration
ENTI (School of New Interactive Technologies) is a public higher education institution that has experienced exponential growth over the last decade. Founded in 2013, it is the reference center in Spain for official training in Serious Games. It was the first organisation to offer official university degrees in this sector, focusing on experiential, practical and technological learning. Created to promote the video game cluster in Catalonia, it also offers ENTI Sound (music production), cybersecurity and business, consolidating itself as a center of technological and artistic talent, both national and international.
The collaboration was made possible thanks to UAB team, who invited ENTI to cooperate in the project by offering their students’ the chance to design a Serious Game for HealthyMindEd with the results of the research. The students are training in the subject "Advanced Mechanics for Video Game Programming", under the direction of Oscar Garcia-Panella, professor, founder and director of the ENTI. The subject is based on a Project Based Learning methodology , where 30 students, organized into five groups, will participate in a gamified competition to create the best video game prototype focused on the scientific results of the HealthyMindEd project.
Objectives and contents of the video game
The main objective of video games will be to help students "survive the digital challenges of higher education" while maintaining successful academic performance and positive mental and physical health. To achieve this, ENTI-UB students have received a specific assignment that includes the development of contents including:
Risk and protective factors in the use of digital environments and new technologies applied in Higher Education.
Consequences of not taking care of digital well-being, both in the short and long term.
Practical recommendations for maintaining a healthy mind and body during university and how to avoid mental health problems resulting from hyper connection or social isolation.
This need arises from the data collected by the project, which indicates that many students suffer from significant levels of distress, loneliness and sleep problems due to the abusive and problematic use of screens and digital environments. The design of a Serious Game will be a key tool to educate about these risks in an attractive and effective way for the academic community.
Schedule and incentives
The collaboration agreement officially kicked off on April 9 with a presentation session by the UAB team to motivate the participants and present the goals and challenges of the project. The students will have eight weeks of intensive work to develop a functional prototype, with a completion date scheduled for June 28. Throughout the process, the UAB team, made up of several members of the Study Group on Expertise and Healthy and Sustainable Human Development (GEDHS), will supervise the development of the video game through biweekly tutorials to ensure that the content on behavior and psychology is correctly integrated. Adrian Díaz (doctoral student specializing in mental health and new technologies), Alejandro García (undergraduate student doing his final degree research in video games and mental health), Dr. Ivan Bonilla (post-doc researcher specializing in video games and professor at INEFC Lleida), Dr. Anna Muro and Dr. Ramon Cladellas (senior researchers and associate professors of the Department of Basic, Evolutionary and Educational Psychology at the UAB) are the UAB team that has concreted the collaboration and will make the execution of the project possible together with the teaching team and students involved at the ENTI.
In recognition of the students' talent and effort, the best project will receive a prize of 500 euros (provided by the HealthyMindEd project) and the two finalists will also receive recognition in the form of a prize and financial support. The award will be presented during the final conference of the project to be held in Barcelona in June 2027, where all participants will be invited and where Òscar Garcia-Pañella will give a keynote speech on new technologies applied to health and education.
With this initiative, HealthyMindEd and ENTI-UAB reaffirm their commitment to educational innovation, the healthy integration of new technologies and virtual environments into academic development and the care of the mental health of new generations of students and future professionals of the 21st century.
