Research on Incentive Mechanism and Evaluation of Gamification Application for Sustainable Consumption in the Context of China

The gamification of sustainable consumption is receiving more and more attention from both academic and business circles. However, there is still a lack of research on the incentive mechanism and evaluation of gamification design to promote sustainable consumption behavior. Taking the gamified apps that promote sustainable consumption in China as an example, this study attempts to explore the incentive mechanism of gamification application for sustainable consumption by using the “stimulus-organism-response” model. Furthermore, it also constructs an evaluation index system of gamification design for sustainable consumption app and identifies the key factors in the gamification design by using the analytic hierarchy process. The results suggest that gamification apps use game elements and game mechanism frameworks to build a new sustainable consumption context for users, which breaks the boundary between reality and virtuality, and enables users to gain real-life value for their behavior in the virtual world. Moreover, the trust mechanism and socialized contextual experience of the gamified apps further strengthen this sense of connectedness and interaction, and enhance the user's motivation for sustainable consumption. In the gamification design of sustainable consumption app, more attention needs to be paid to the implementation effect behind gamification, that is, to promote the cultivation of public sustainable consumption values and lifestyle. This study advances theoretical and practical understanding of the gamification of sustainable consumption. The results can also be used as a starting base for the development and design of gamified apps in the sustainable consumption field.

Introduction

The network information technology and related digital application have been widely used to impact and change individual consumption practices and lifestyle, among which gamification is one of the most famous ways. Gamification has the characteristics and attributes of games, which can provide users with a game-like experience and make business processes more attractive (Werbach and Hunter, 2020). There is a significant difference between gamification and gaming. The game just stays on the fun level, but gamification must go beyond pure fun. It requires customers to have fun while also encouraging them to change their behaviors and solve specific problems (Robson et al., 2016). At present, there is no uniform definition of gamification in academic circles, but the definition proposed by Deterding et al. (2011) is generally accepted, that is, gamification is described as the use of game design elements in a non-game context.

Gamification has been successfully applied in many fields. Gamification was initially used primarily in marketing. Specifically, gamification elements have been applied to various marketing campaigns to give online consumers a kind of game experience, in order to increase online consumers' participation in online store marketing activities and further generate corresponding purchase behavior such as applying gamification to advertising to enhance interactivity (Terlutter and Capella, 2013; Bittner and Shipper, 2014; Vashisht et al., 2019; Sreejesh et al., 2021), and applying gamification elements to word-of-mouth recommendations to improve the quality of reviews (Hofacker et al., 2016; Vashisht et al., 2019; Mishra and Malhotra, 2021; Sreejesh et al., 2021). In terms of human resources, gamification design can run through every link in the field of human resources management (Simpson and Jenkins, 2015; Korn et al., 2017). Enterprises can take advantage of the game to recruit staff, implement staff management, enhance the level of employees' skills and professional ethics quality, and boost the enthusiasm of the employees to participate in training (Simpson and Jenkins, 2015; Prasad et al., 2019; Walls, 2021). In the field of education, the application of gamification in the classroom can save manpower, material resources and financial resources, and also can influence students' behavior or attitude to improve their academic performance and learning satisfaction (Dicheva et al., 2015; Kim et al., 2018; Rahardja et al., 2019). In fitness products, gamified design has a significant effect on persuading patients to abide by treatment principles, improving their health status, promoting health cognition and meeting social and emotional needs (Brauner et al., 2013; Cotton and Patel, 2019; Tu et al., 2019). In the application of health management, the design of customization, simulation, self-monitoring, suggestion, individuation, simulation, praise, reward, comparison, competition and cooperation mechanisms can promote the change of users' habits and health behavior (Brauner et al., 2013; Johnson et al., 2016; Cotton and Patel, 2019; Zolfaghari et al., 2021). In addition, examples of gamification can be found in different application areas such as sustainable development, environmentally conscious behavior, enterprise resource planning, production logistics, and supporting innovation processes (Fuentes, 2016; Wanick and Bui, 2019; Warmelink et al., 2020; Werbach and Hunter, 2020).

Driven by digital technology, the realistic context of propagation and communication has been profoundly changed. The birth of VR, AI, big data, and other emerging technologies has provided strong support for the deep integration of information communication and entertainment. Some Gamification apps based on emerging digital technologies to promote public sustainable consumption behavior are gradually growing (Fuentes, 2016; Guillen et al., 2021). These applications integrate social networking and game design concepts to promote interaction between users and products, which can effectively improve users' awareness of eco-environmental protection and promote the change of green attitude and sustainable consumption behavior (Huber and Hilty, 2015; Fuentes, 2016; Mattsson, 2019; Mulcahy et al., 2020). However, the applied research of gamification apps for sustainable consumption is still in its infancy.

Currently, researches on gamification in the field of sustainable consumption mainly focus on the following aspects. Some studies have discussed the technology means for implementing gamification toward individual sustainable consumption, such as the development, testing, and monitoring of mobile applications (apps), Internet of Things, machine learning, big data, wearable technologies, and other augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) technologies (Huber and Hilty, 2015; Mulcahy et al., 2020; Ashfaq et al., 2021; Guillen et al., 2021). In addition, some scholars have studied the principles, objectives, strategies, and specific game elements of the gamification design, while others have investigated the users' attitudes and willingness to use gamified applications for sustainable consumption from different perspectives and levels (Mattsson, 2019; Piligrimiene et al., 2020; Ashfaq et al., 2021; Luo et al., 2021). However, there is still a lack of research on the incentive mechanism of gamification apps to promote sustainable consumption behavior. In particular, at present, the gamification design for consumption sustainable app has not formed a systematic evaluation index system, which is of great significance to the improvement of game experience and the promotion and use of gamification app for sustainable consumption.

Therefore, taking the gamified apps that promote sustainable consumption in China as an example, this study summarizes and conceptualizes the characteristics and mechanism of the gamification design for sustainable consumption app. It attempts to reveal the incentive process and mechanism of gamification to promote users' sustainable consumption behavior by comprehensively and deeply identifying and analyzing each component of the gamification apps, as well as their respective functions and interaction relations in the system. Furthermore, based on practical cases, this paper also tries to construct the evaluation index system of gamification design for sustainable consumption app, and use analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to identify the key factors in the gamified design for sustainable consumption app. This study not only has certain theoretical significance to supplement the existing research, but also has implications for managers and designers to develop better gamification app to promote the transition of the public to sustainable consumption behavior.

Materials and Methods

The overall analysis process and framework of this paper are shown below. First, based on the specific elements and use process of gamification app, this study explores the incentive mechanism of gamification application for sustainable consumption by using the SOR model. Secondly, based on the gamification design features and practical application effects of sustainable consumption app, an evaluation index system for gamification design is constructed. By using the AHP method, it tries to identify the key factors of the gamification design of sustainable consumer app. The evaluation index system proposed in this paper can not only be applied to identify the gamification design problems in the existing sustainable consumption app, but also can provide references for future gamification design in this field.

Gamification Application for Sustainable Consumption in China

In recent years, China's Internet giants have gradually launched gamification apps to promote the public's transition to sustainable consumption behavior such as Ant Forest launched by Alibaba, and Xiaodu Farm launched by Baidu. They have similar operating processes and incentive mechanisms. Considering the influence and practical application effect of the app, this study takes Ant Forest as an example to study the incentive mechanism of gamification design for sustainable consumption.

Ant Forest uses a gamification strategy to combine low-carbon and sustainable consumption publicity with games, changing the previous propagation mode guided by publicity. This enables the public to better understand sustainable consumption during the entertainment process. In Ant Forest, users can accumulate online virtual energy through offline sustainable consumption behaviors, which can be used to cultivate the virtual tree online. When the virtual tree in the game matures, the corresponding real tree will be planted in the desert. This kind of gamification app is regarded as an innovative practice of propagating green and low carbon concept, and also brings new enlightenment to promote the public's sustainable consumption lifestyle.

The operation process of the gamification app can be roughly divided into 4 steps. First, users enter the mobile app to receive virtual saplings. Users can choose different tree species according to their preferences and goals such as Populus, Spruce, Pinus sylvestris, etc. (see Figure 1). The second step is the offline consumption activities of users. The app (Alipay) cooperates with different life service platforms and merchants to provide users with diversified life service scenarios for users. Users complete and record the sustainable consumption behaviors they choose to participate in through the app (see Table 1). The third step is the accumulation of virtual energy values and the cultivation of virtual trees. Every offline low-carbon sustainable consumption activity corresponds to a certain amount of virtual energy. Users accumulate green energy through a variety of low-carbon sustainable consumption behaviors, and cultivate trees virtually online. The fourth step refers to the feedback from virtual to reality. When the required energy is reached (i.e., the virtual tree online is mature), a corresponding real tree will be planted for the user in the desert area. Ant Forest cooperates with related public welfare foundations, and entrusts offline tree planting projects to professional institutions. Finally, the offline planting task is completed with the help of local farmers and herdsmen, forest farms, or tree planting companies, so as to convert the virtual trees cultivated by users into real trees in a timely manner. The user can choose the planting area, and each tree has a unique number. Users can see real-life photos of the woodland through the satellite and the built-in “camera” of the app to understand the geographic location and growth status of the saplings.

FIGURE 1

Figure 1. The required virtual energy used to exchange offline real tree species.

TABLE 1

Table 1. The virtual energy value corresponding to the offline sustainable consumption behavior.

SOR Model

The core of the gamification design is the game element. The game element is also the basis for studying the incentive mechanisms of gamified apps for sustainable consumption. For game element, the three-dimensionality of dynamics, mechanics and components proposed by Werbach and Hunter (2015) is the most accepted and widely used classification method for researchers. Constraint, emotion, narrative, progression, and relationship are typical dynamic elements that are integral concepts in gamified systems (Werbach and Hunter, 2015, 2020). Mechanics elements mainly include feedback, cooperation, transactions, challenges, competition, resource acquisition, rewards, etc. (Werbach and Hunter, 2015, 2020). In the process of gamification design, the mechanics elements represent the basic process of promoting gamification and user participation (Werbach and Hunter, 2015, 2020). In addition, components refer to the concrete examples of motivation and mechanics in gamification design, such as points, badges, leaderboards, social graphs, avatars, teams, and virtual goods (Werbach and Hunter, 2015, 2020).

The general pattern of human behavior is “SOR”, that is, “stimulus-organism-response” (Jacoby, 2002; Kim et al., 2020). The SOR pattern has been widely used to study consumer motivation and behavior (Chang et al., 2011; Chen and Yao, 2018; Wu and Li, 2018). It argues that consumers' behavior is caused by stimuli, which come from the internal factors (e.g., individual factors in both physiology and psychology) and external environment factors (Chang et al., 2011; Kim et al., 2020). Combining the three-dimensionality of dynamics, mechanics and components of the gamification elements, Gatautis et al. (2016a,b) developed the SOR conceptual model of gamification marketing, as shown in Figure 2. In the context of gamification, components elements are used as stimulus factors to change the psychological state of consumers through dynamics elements, thereby further affecting consumers' decision-making and actions (Gatautis et al., 2016a,b). In addition, the mechanics elements of the game are not only directly related to the actions of consumers, but also affect the components elements and continuously generate a new round of stimuli (Gatautis et al., 2016a,b). Based on the specific elements and use process of gamification app, this study explores the incentive mechanism of gamification application for sustainable consumption by using the SOR model.

FIGURE 2

Figure 2. A conceptual model of the impact of gamification on consumer behavior.

AHP Method

The AHP is a kind of hierarchical weight decision analysis approach proposed by professor Satie in the early 1970s by applying network system theory and multi-objective comprehensive evaluation method (Saaty, 1988, 1990). As a combination of qualitative and quantitative, systematic and hierarchical analysis methods, it has good practicability and effectiveness in dealing with decision-making and evaluation problems and has been widely used in economic planning and management, energy policy and distribution, market evaluation and product development, and other fields (Sun et al., 2017; Darko et al., 2019; Dos Santos et al., 2019; Rajak and Shaw, 2019; Yucesan and Kahraman, 2019). The whole analysis process of AHP can be divided into four steps.

(1) Build a hierarchical model

The purpose of this step is to construct a hierarchical structure diagram for decision-making goals or evaluation indexes at different levels according to their interrelationships (Taherdoost, 2017).

(2) Construct a judgment matrix

The judgment matrix is constructed by pairwise comparison method and 1–9 comparison scale for factors in the same layer which belong to (or influence) each factor in the upper layer (Vaidya and Kumar, 2006; Taherdoost, 2017). The elements of the judgment matrix are shown in Equation (1).

$\begin{array}{ll}{E}_{ij}=\frac{1}{E_{ji}}& (1)\end{array}$

With E_ij referring to the importance of factor i relative to factor j. The scale method for judging matrix elements is shown in Table 2.

TABLE 2

Table 2. Scale method for the elements.

(3) Weight vector calculation and consistency test

The eigenvector corresponding to the largest eigenvalue (i.e., λ_max) of the judgment matrix is normalized. The elements of the normalized eigenvector correspond to the weights of the indicators at the same level. The determination of the weight vector requires a consistency test, and the consistency index (CI) can be calculated by Equation (2).

$\begin{array}{ll}CI=\frac{{\lambda }_{max}-n}{n-1}& (2)\end{array}$

With λ referring to the eigenvalue of the judgment matrix, n referring to the order (dimension) of the judgment matrix. CI = 0 means that E is a completely consistent judgment matrix. The smaller the CI, the greater the consistency, that is, the smaller the judgment error caused by the calculation of the index weight by using the eigenvector (Saaty, 1990; Sun et al., 2017). The smaller CI is, the better consistency is. In other words, using the eigenvector corresponding to the maximum eigenvalue as the weight vector of the compared factor will lead to a small judgment error. In order to measure the size of CI, the random consistency index RI is introduced, as shown in Equation (3).

$\begin{array}{ll}RI=\frac{C{I}_1+C{I}_2+\dots +C{I}_n}{n}& (3)\end{array}$

RI is related to the order of the judgment matrix. In general, the greater the order of the matrix, the greater the probability of random deviations from consistency. Based on CI and RI, the final result of the consistency test, that is, the consistency ratio (CR), can be calculated by Equation (4).

$\begin{array}{ll}CR=\frac{CI}{RI}& (4)\end{array}$

As a rule, if CR < 0.1, the consistency test is passed, otherwise there is no satisfactory consistency of the judgment matrix (Saaty, 1990; Taherdoost, 2017).

(4) Sequencing for all indicators

This process is carried out sequentially from the highest level to the lowest level. First, it calculates the relative importance (weighted value) of all factors at a certain level to the highest level. Then, the all the indicators are sorted according to their weight values.

Evaluation Index System Construction and Data Collection

Evaluating the gamification design in gamification application projects can provide service providers with gamification design standards, improve the overall quality of games and user experience, so as to provide support for the healthy and sustainable development of gamification products. Existing studies on gamification design evaluation generally adopt a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods with different emphases (Sun et al., 2017; Rajak and Shaw, 2019; Yucesan and Kahraman, 2019). Some studies focus on the overall goals, content, and principles of gamification design, emphasizing the impact, value, and significance of gamification design (Terlutter and Capella, 2013; Landers et al., 2018; Ashfaq et al., 2021; Zolfaghari et al., 2021). Some studies focus on the dimension of gamification design, taking into account the factors that affect users' interactive experience (human-human interactive and human-machine interactive experience) such as artistic sense, immersed feeling, sense of achievement, perceived controllability, entertainment, social interaction, and incentive mechanism (Bittner and Shipper, 2014; Zuckerman and Gal-Oz, 2014; Piligrimiene et al., 2020; Guillen et al., 2021). In addition, in the game design of sustainable consumption projects, due to the openness and collaboration attribute of the project itself, a large number of users with different backgrounds conduct a variety of operation behaviors such as search, communication, and evaluation within the system, which puts forward higher requirements for the friendliness of the interface, the timeliness of response, and the stability and ease of use of the system (Sever et al., 2015; Cotton and Patel, 2019; Toda et al., 2019; Zolfaghari et al., 2021). Therefore, system support is selected as a first-grade index of the game design evaluation system. Finally, in the digital age, trust is the foundation of all development. The normal operation and growth of all digital businesses and platforms are inseparable from the support of trust mechanisms (Ramadan, 2017; Aparicio et al., 2021; Ashfaq et al., 2021). The game design of an app for sustainable consumption projects is no exception. With that in mind, this study selects the trust system as a first-grade evaluation index, including four secondary indexes such as personal privacy, the credibility of the content and statement within the app, trust in app's operation and motivation, and the real feedback (from the feedback in the virtual world to real-world feedback). The details about the evaluation index system of gamification design for sustainable consumption apps are presented in Table 3.

TABLE 3

Table 3. Evaluation index system of gamification design for sustainable consumption app.

In order to ensure the scientificity and preciseness of the research, this study invites sustainable consumption researchers, industry personnel who have deeply participated in the design of gamification and sustainable consumption app as group decision-making experts. The questionnaire was designed according to the evaluation index system in Table 3. During the construction of the indicator system and the design of the questionnaire, 4 University professors in related research fields and 3 experts from the gamification research institute were invited to participate in the evaluation and improvement through emails and face-to-face interviews to ensure the scientificity and rationality of the evaluation index system and questionnaire. Finally, we designed a nine-point Likert-type scale questionnaire containing 4 first-grade indicators and a total of 43 measurement items. The details of the questionnaire are presented in Table 4.

TABLE 4

Table 4. Questionnaire for the evaluation of sustainable consumption gamification applications.

The questionnaire was created and distributed using the Wenjuanxing platform (https://www.wjx.cn), which is the most widely used online survey, assessment, voting platform in China. The respondents were experts, academics, designers, and developers in the field of gamification design and application. This study used a simple snowball sampling technique. First, the questionnaire link was shared with the 8 selected experts through WeChat. These experts then send the link to other experts and scholars in the field of gamification field they recommend. A total of 40 questionnaires were distributed in this study. After excluding 5 blank questionnaires and 3 questionnaires with missing key data, 32 valid questionnaires were used for further analysis.

Results

Incentive Mechanism of Gamification App for Sustainable Consumption

This study takes Ant Forest as an example to study the incentive mechanism of gamification design for sustainable consumption using the SOR model. The details are presented in Figure 3. For Ant Forest, the main game component elements are the virtual green energy value, and virtual tree, social graph, and a variety of life scene settings. The main game dynamics elements mainly include Emotions, Progression, and Relationships. Progression refers to the accumulation of energy and the cultivation of saplings is a long-term growth process. The nurturing process enables users to develop an emotional attachment. In particular, when enough energy is accumulated to convert the virtual tree into an actual tree, this will bring a sense of accomplishment to the user. The relationship emphasizes the social network construction in the app and the interaction between users, which can to a large extent strengthen the gamified interpersonal interaction experience and user stickiness. The mechanics elements of the Ant Forest are competition and cooperation. It constructs a new sustainable consumption situation for users, breaks the boundary between reality and virtuality, and enables users' behavior in the virtual world to obtain real value. As to the users can obtain resources (energy value) through competition and cooperation. Particularly, the mapping feedback between the virtual tree and the real tree breaks the boundary between reality and virtuality, and enables users to obtain real value for their behavior in the virtual world. According to the SOR model (see Figures 2, 3), in the Ant Forest, virtual energy values, virtual trees, social graphs, and daily life scenes are stimulus factors for gamification design. These game components elements influence and change the psychological state of users under the impact of dynamics elements such as emotions, progression, and relationships, thereby prompting them to participate in sustainable consumption behavior. The mechanism of competition and cooperation in gamification affect the components elements and continuously generate a new round of stimuli.

FIGURE 3

Figure 3. Conceptual model of the incentive mechanism of gamification application for sustainable consumption.

Ant Forest inculcates eco-environmental protection and green consumption concepts to users in a popular and interesting form, and stimulates sustainable consumption to a certain extent. In terms of user participation, the platform has set up multiple scenarios and multiple types of tree species to attract users. The focus of work and task of gamification at this stage is to identify and construct various scenes of daily life, and record and quantify the low-carbon sustainable consumption behaviors with green energy values. According to the tree planting strategy on the Ant Forest platform, users can convert carbon emission reductions into online green energy through various methods such as green travel, reducing travel, reducing the use of paper and plastic, and other high-efficiency energy saving and recycling behavior. Ant Forest has also cooperated with China Beijing Environment Exchange (CBEEX) and other institutions to develop a set of algorithms for calculating carbon emission reductions corresponding to low-carbon behaviors in different scenarios. Meanwhile, the platform makes full use of the interactivity of social networks to increase user engagement. Users can either give their energy to their friends through “watering”, or go to their friends' forests to collect more green energy to help their saplings grow as quickly as possible. Ant Forest provides a variety of cooperation scenarios such as a family tree, love tree, classmate forest, colleague forest, friend tree, and so on. Users can use the energy obtained from co-watering to co-plant trees such as Pinus sylvestris, Huashan pine, spruce, and Populus euphratica that require higher energy values.

In sum, Ant Forest connects online and offline scenes, combines commerce, social interaction, low-carbon behavior, and public welfare, attracts users to participate in eco-environment protection and sustainable consumption activities through entertainment, and cultivates the public's green and low-carbon life concept. The core driving force of Ant Forest is mission, ownership, and social interaction. The game design theme is planting trees, and users can donate saplings through their public welfare behavior and consumption. During the game, users can not only gain rewards but also realize the sublimation of self-value, which is also in line with the value goal of the product itself.

In addition, it cultivates user behaviors and habits by virtue of the built-in social chain and rich social gameplay of app products, so as to achieve the goal of improving user stickiness.

Evaluation for Gamification Design of Sustainable Consumption App

Based on the survey data and the AHP method, the weight coefficients of the evaluation indicators are presented in Tables 5, 6. It can be seen from Tables 5, 6 that CR values of all judgment matrices are <0.1, that is, all matrices have passed the consistency test and have satisfactory consistency. After passing the consistency test, the weight coefficients of each indicator of the gamification design evaluation system of sustainable consumption app were calculated by multiplying the weights of the index at all levels layer by layer. The detailed results are shown in Figure 4.

TABLE 5

Table 5. The weight coefficients of the four first grade indicators.

TABLE 6

Table 6. The weight coefficients of the second-grade indicators.

FIGURE 4

Figure 4. Gamification design evaluation index weights for sustainable consumption app.

As shown in Table 4, The weight coefficients of four first-grade indicators overall principles and objectives (A), the interactive experience of the game (B), system support (C), trust (D) are 19.80, 29.72, 13.59, and 36.88%, respectively. It can be found that the importance of trust and interactive experience in the gamification design of an app for sustainable consumption is higher than that of the overall principles and objectives and the system support.

At the level of first-grade indicator of the trust system (D), the weight coefficients of four second grade indicators personal privacy (D1), the credibility of the content and statement (D2), trust in app's operation and motivation (D3), and real feedback (D4) are 25.62, 16.47, 18.57, and 39.44%, respectively. It can be seen that providing real feedback and protecting personal privacy are the most important factors in the game design of sustainable consumption app projects.

At the level of first-grade indicator of the interactive experience (B), incentive mechanism (25.54%) and social interaction (19.45%) have high weight coefficients, followed by entertainment (15.40%) and perceived controllability (11.82%), while the weight coefficients of artistic sense (10.80%), sense of achievement (9.08%), immersed feeling (7.90%) in the game design are the lowest.

Among the four indicators of overall principles and objectives (A), value proposition (38.85%) is considered to be the most important, and its weight coefficient is much greater than that scenario design (25.65%), clarity of objectives (21.35%), and logic of content (13.15%).

As to the system support (C), the weight coefficients of the openness and collaboration, timeliness of response, ease of use, system stability, and the friendliness of the interface are 28.37, 27.53, 21.10, 12.38, and 10.62%, respectively. It can be seen that gamified design of sustainable consumption app pays more attention to openness and collaboration, timeliness of response, and the ease of use.

Figure 4 presents all the weight coefficients of the evaluation index of gamification design for sustainable consumption app. It can be seen that the real feedback (14.51%), personal privacy (9.45%), value proposition (7.69%), and incentive mechanism (7.59%) are the most critical factor in the design and development process of gamification apps for sustainable consumption. In addition, the credibility of the content and statement (6.07%), trust in the app's operation and motivation (6.85%), social interaction (5.78%), scenario design (5.08%), and entertainment (4.58%) are also important factors that cannot be ignored.

It is worth noting that the overall ranking of the secondary index weight under the two dimensions of game interactive experience and system support are relatively low. This indicates that in the game design of sustainable consumption apps, games are only a form of representation and an auxiliary means to trigger users' participation motivation, rather than the focus of the design.

Discussion and Conclusions

Taking the gamified apps that promote sustainable consumption in China as an example, based on the specific elements and use process of gamification app, this study explores the incentive mechanism of gamification application for sustainable consumption by using the SOR model. Furthermore, it also constructs an evaluation index system of gamification design for sustainable consumption app and identifies the key factors in the gamification design by using the analytic hierarchy process. The contributions of this study are as follows.

Gamification app for sustainable consumption can be characterized as “multiple behavioral scene settings, online and offline and the virtuality and reality combination, multi-party participation and cooperation”. It uses technological innovation and gamification design to objectively and truly quantify the impact of daily low-carbon sustainable consumption behavior of the public. Specifically, gamification apps link the public's daily low-carbon and sustainable consumption behavior with eco-environment protection and public benefit activities (e.g., planting trees in Ant Forest), and adopt a combination of online and offline virtual and actual practices to stimulate the public's enthusiasm for practicing green, low-carbon and sustainable consumption. This is of great significance in promoting the public's transition to green and sustainable consumption behavior.

The core driving force of the gamification app for sustainable consumption is the mission, ownership, and social interaction. During the game, users can not only gain rewards through sustainable consumption behavior, but also realize the sublimation of self-value, which is also in line with the value goal of the product itself. In addition, it cultivates user behaviors and habits by virtue of the built-in social chain and rich social gameplay of app products, so as to achieve the aim of improving user stickiness.

The evaluation index system includes four main dimensions: overall principles and objectives, game interactive experience, system support and trust system, with a total of 20 sublevel evaluation indexes. The trust system and game interactive experience dimension are given a large weight, which is mainly reflected in secondary indicators such as real feedback, protection of personal privacy, incentive mechanism and social interaction. This shows that how to ensure and improve the trust mechanism and the interactive experience brought by gamification design is the focus of gamification design for sustainable consumption app. At the same time, the openness and cooperation, ease of use, and timeliness of response of the system support dimension are the basis for the effective operation of the gamified app of sustainable projects. The value proposition and scenario design in the overall principles and objectives dimension are important driving forces to promote public participation and enhance user stickiness.

It is worth noting that in the game design of sustainable consumption app, games are only a form of representation and an auxiliary means to trigger users' participation motivation, rather than the focus of the design. More attention is paid on the implementation effect behind gamification, that is, to promote the cultivation of public sustainable consumption values and lifestyle. Therefore, in the process of gamification design of sustainable consumption apps, it is necessary to strengthen the representation of gamification elements and the construction of trust system by relying on scenarios setting, pay attention to improving system quality and interactive experience, and improve relevant functions and mechanisms of the gamification.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the United Nations General Assembly in the 2030 Agenda have been widely recognized and promoted around the world. As one of the 17 SDGs, responsible consumption and production has been an important development direction in China's transition to sustainability in recent years. In the consumer sector, although the government, media, enterprises, and non-governmental organizations have made great efforts to publicize and advocate low-carbon lifestyle and sustainable consumption behaviors, this kind of persuasive one-way publicity is difficult to fully mobilize the public's willingness to actively participate. Moreover, there is also greater uncertainty in the implementation of specific actions. Gamification apps based on digital technologies have opened a promising path to promote the transition to sustainability. It integrates eco-environmental protection information with games, makes use of the sharing and interactive characteristics of social media, and attracts users to participate in sustainable consumption behavior in a fun and gamified way. This can better stimulate the interest of users to participate, and allow the public to subtly accept the concept of sustainable consumption and apply it to life practice. This study advances theoretical and practical understanding of the gamification app of sustainable consumption. The results can also be used as a starting base for the development and design of gamified apps in the sustainable consumption field. The index evaluation system proposed in this paper can not only be used to evaluate the application effect of existing gamification app, but also provide a reference framework for designers to develop better gamified app products to promote public sustainable consumption behavior.

However, there are still some limitations in this study. First, based on the specific gamification elements and use process of gamification app, this study explores the impact mechanism of gamification apps for sustainable consumption by using the SOR model. However, the research on the mechanism of gamification apps for sustainable consumption based on the SOR model is still somewhat simplified. In particular, this study only makes a general classification of game elements, but does not make a specific analysis of individual elements. Therefore, more detailed and rigorous empirical studies are needed in the future. In addition to the SOR model, more theoretical models and frameworks can be used to study the mechanism of gamification apps for sustainable consumption. Secondly, because the gamification app of sustainable consumption is still in the early development stage, there is not much empirical evidence to refer to in the process of constructing the evaluation index system. With the development and growth of gamification apps of sustainable projects, the entire evaluation index system can be continuously improved, and its effectiveness can also be verified by more practical application examples. Finally, the empirical analysis of this paper is based on a small sample. In the future, this study will be repeated with a larger sample and with actual users of these gamified applications. In particular, further exploration of the cognitive differences between sustainable consumption researchers, gamification designers, and actual users is a very worthy direction of research.

Data Availability Statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding authors.

Author Contributions

SS and ZW contributed to the conceptualization, empirical analysis, and first draft of the manuscript. QW helped with research design and data collection and processing. WW contributed to supervision, project management, research design, resources, and revising the draft. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher's Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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