Jogo sério para treino de competências sociais como instrumento de prevenção do bullying

Abstract

We have conceived and developed a Serious Game to promote empathy as a mean to prevent bullying. The tests we carried out with youngsters from the target audience (10 to 12 years old) show that our approach has potential in bullying prevention and as a therapy auxiliary tool. The rationale for bullying prevention is that by helping victims and observers of these aggressive episodes to improve their skills and to practice different strategies towards bullying, they will be training and improving their behavioral competences for real bullying situations. This project, whose team includes psychologists and informatics engineers, is an answer both to the high prevalence of bullying and to the lack of effective interventions focused on this problem. The game runs on different platforms (tablet, PC), provides flexibility in the choice of scenarios and in the game playing role. Player’s decisions have obvious effects in the subsequent levels of the game. The treatment or intervention resorting to this game may take place at the therapist’s office, the school or in an independent manner. In every game session a data set is recorded for later analysis. We also implemented a Back Office application integrated with the game to support the work of the therapist or researcher.