The Impact of a Gameful Breathing Training Visualization on Intrinsic Experiential Value, Perceived Effectiveness, and Engagement Intentions: Between-Subject Online Experiment

BACKGROUND: Slow-paced breathing has been shown to be positively associated with psychological and physiological health. In practice, however, there is little long-term engagement with breathing training, as shown by the usage statistics of breathing training apps. New research suggests that gameful smartphone-delivered breathing training may address this challenge. OBJECTIVE: This study assesses the impact of breathing training, guided by a gameful visualization, on perceived experiential and instrumental values and the intention to engage in such training. METHODS: A between-subject online experiment with 170 participants was conducted, and one-way multiple analysis of variance and two-tailed t test analyses were used to test for any difference in intrinsic experiential value, perceived effectiveness, and the intention to engage in either a breathing training with a gameful or a nongameful guidance visualization. Moreover, prior experience in gaming and meditation practices were assessed as moderator variables for a preliminary analysis. RESULTS: The intrinsic experiential value for the gameful visualization was found to be significantly higher compared to the nongameful visualization (P=.001), but there was no difference in either perceived effectiveness (P=.50) or the intention to engage (P=.44). The preliminary analysis of the influence of meditation and gaming experience on the outcomes indicates that people with more meditation experience yielded higher intrinsic experiential values from using the gameful visualization than people with no or little meditation experience (P=.03). This analysis did not find any additional evidence of gaming time or meditation experience impacting the outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: The gameful visualization was found to increase the intrinsic experiential value of the breathing training without decreasing the perceived effectiveness. However, there were no differences in intentions to engage in both breathing training conditions. Furthermore, gaming and meditation experiences seem to have no or only a small positive moderating effect on the relationship between the gameful visualization and the intrinsic experiential value. Future longitudinal field studies are required to assess the impact of gameful breathing training on actual behavior, that is, long-term engagement and outcomes.