A gaming approach to learning medical microbiology: students’ experiences of flow

Abstract

Background: There is a growing awareness in medical education of general skills¹ required for lifelong learning. Such skills are best achieved when students experience positive affective states while they are learning, as put forth by the Csikszentmihalyian theory of flow. This study describes how a quiz-type board game was used in the School of Medicine of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of the Free State to address students' negativity towards medical microbiology. Methods: The study population consisted of third-year medical students who had recently completed the Infections module of the undergraduate Learning Programme for Professional Medicine. Results: Data gathered by means of two questionnaire surveys and direct observation showed that the game impacted positively on students' perceptions of and attitudes towards medical microbiology as a subject. A high perceived probability of the game contributing to the acquisition of general skills was recorded, since the experience of positive affect during the process of informal learning went hand-in-hand with heightened team effort and spontaneous communication. Conclusions: This article may be of value to health educators who wish to supplement formal teaching with informal learning so as to enhance not only the recall of factual knowledge, but also the advancement of general skills.