“Earthquake in the City”; using real life gamification model for teaching professional commitment in high school students

Abstract Professional commitment plays a significant role in all professions. Moreover, schools are valuable fields for teaching the principles of these concepts especially through novel methods such as gamification. "Earthquake in the city" was implemented in a school in Tehran, Iran, and its effectiveness on learning the concepts of professional commitment was evaluated. "Earthquake in the city" was built based upon a fantasy scenario occurring in an imaginary city. Each student took on a role in the city (citizen or healthcare provider). After finishing the game, participants were asked about the concept of professional commitment. Their definition was scored by a group of medical ethics experts separately in terms of compliance with the actual definitions and compared with their peers in the control group who did not participate in the game. A group of 16-year-old teenagers studying in the 11th grade participated in this intervention. The average score of conformity with the actual concept of professional commitment among the case group participants was significantly higher than the average value for the control group (P < 0.05). The results of this study could provide insights to planners and educators engaged in the education system so that gamification can be incorporated as an influential tool to teach the concepts of professional commitment. This experience can also be generalized to other concepts, but designing the appropriate scenario will be the most important component of the intervention in these cases.