A chatbot for building intrinsic motivation among students in a flipped classroom setting

The thesis aims to build intrinsic motivation among students in the flipped class by using a chatbot. In flipped classes, sometimes students face low motivation due to a lot of preparation content. Due to low motivation students often skip preparatory learning assignments, a phenomenon that is observed both in literature and a real-world case study. Intrinsic motivation is important for good learning outcomes. Starting point of the research are three approaches that are mentioned in the Self Determination Theory. This theory states that feelings of autonomy, relatedness, and competency enhance intrinsic motivation among subjects. Peer modeling enhances intrinsic motivation among students by showcasing the learning experiences of similar professional and educational backgrounds of students. Organismic Integration Theory states that by explaining the importance of a learning topic students choose to study the topic autonomously thereby enhancing intrinsic motivation. The use of chatbots with intrinsic motivation-building factors from theories like Self Determination is on the rise in a flipped classroom. The goal of the research is to incorporate the motivation-building factors of “peer modeling” and “explain the importance of learning topics” in chatbot design for building intrinsic motivation among students in a flipped classroom. The thesis follows the design science methodology to build an innovative chatbot named Flippy with the above intrinsic motivation-building factors for the students learning in a flipped classroom. The chatbot is evaluated by forty-three students. The students gave a survey-based rating based on the Intrinsic motivation inventory as per Self-Determination Theory. Many students agreed to have experienced the feeling of autonomy (63 % agreed) and relatedness (84 % agreed) during chatbot interaction. The relatedness is concerning the friendly and easy-going nature of the Flippy chatbot. Autonomy is concerning the flexibility given by the chatbot to students to explore the learning topic as per their choice and pace. Students agreed to experience fun (43 % agreed) and developed interest (42 % agreed) in the learning topic during chatbot interaction. The feeling of interest is a direct indicator of intrinsic motivation. A comparatively smaller number of students experienced negative feelings of anxiety (5% agreed) and pressure (21% agreed) for homework after chatbot interaction. The chatbot scored less in terms of competency feeling among students concerning confidence in their skills (32% agreed) and confidence to prepare for the topic (26% agreed) and inspiration to prepare (28% agreed) after watching peer experiences. The students liked the features of customization, the significance of the topic, and peer modeling the most in the given order. The reward section was liked by fewer students. Sixty-five % of students said that they would like to use Flippy again while 35% said they won’t like to use it again. The overall student response to the Flippy chatbot was positive. Many students (42%) showed signs of intrinsic motivation in learning the topic. To further increase intrinsic motivation and especially the feeling of competency among more students some enhancements can be done to the chatbot design. For example, providing more video peer model experiences at the start of chatbot interaction in the main menu. This provides more autonomy to students, and they get inspired by students' experiences at the start without having any preconceived notions about the learning topic. From student surveys, many students gave their preference for the use of video-based examples for peer experiences. Also, providing more than one peer model experience enhances the feeling of self-efficacy among students. The chatbot features and the design guidelines provided in the thesis will help the tutors, chatbot designers, and researchers to incorporate factors of peer modeling and explanation of the importance of topics in combination with other intrinsic motivation-building design factors in their chatbot designs. These guidelines also include suggestions for enhancements and hints to improve the existing chatbot features based on the feedback and opinions of the students provided in the evaluation surveys and interviews.