The eight principles of gamification according to Yu-Kai Chou

In this interview, Yu-Kai Chou, the visionary president of Octalysis, shares the eight fundamental principles that transform monotonous but essential activities through game elements. According to Chou, they offer an innovative way to improve user experience while addressing crucial aspects of human motivation.

Chou's principles form an octagon in which “everything you do is based on one or more core drives,” he says. These drives are Meaning and Calling, Development and Accomplishment, Empowerment of Creativity, Ownership and Possession, Social Influence and Relatedness, Scarcity and Impatience, Unpredictability and Curiosity, and Loss. Each addresses specific aspects of human motivation, creating a comprehensive framework for effective gamification.

Chou emphasizes that these principles result from years of deep research into what makes games engaging. Without motivational principles, actions have no drive and behavior does not occur. His framework offers a comprehensive analysis based on empathy and understanding human motivations, helping apply gamification effectively to turn everyday, essential activities into engaging, motivating experiences.

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Read the transcript below:

Gamification is the art of combining the fun elements of games with things that are relatively boring and routine but probably very important.

My name is Yu-Kai Chou, and I am one of the pioneers in gamification. I have helped many companies, including Tesla, Google and Apple. From my experience, gamification is useful when motivation and behavioral action are key components of success.

Often you want customers to buy something, which clearly relates to motivation and behavior. But wanting employees to be more creative or collaborative also involves motivation.

I would say that whenever a desired behavior can be defined, gamification can improve it. I am best known for the Octalysis framework, the result of many years studying exactly what makes a game engaging.

After years of research, I realized that every successful game has what I call the eight core drives of motivation, combined in an octagon-based analysis. The key is that everything you do is based on one or more of these drives. Without a drive, there is no motivation and no behavior.

Epic meaning and calling

The first drive is epic meaning and calling. We are motivated because we feel part of something greater than ourselves.

People contribute to Wikipedia because they feel they are protecting human knowledge. It is bigger than they are.

Games often use this: the world is about to end, and somehow you are the only person who can save it. That is motivating. Saving the world is epic meaning and calling.

Development and accomplishment

The second drive is development and accomplishment. We feel we are improving, leveling up and mastering something, and that motivates us. Most points and badges in traditional gamification fall into this category.

Points are simply counters that create a sense of progress. Even when you repeat the same action or press the same buttons day after day, a progress bar moves or a number increases, and you feel you are advancing.

Creativity and feedback

The third drive is empowerment of creativity and feedback, like LEGO.

Give users a set of basic building blocks, and there are almost infinite ways to be creative, try strategies, receive feedback and adjust. That process creates a great deal of interest.

Ownership and possession

The fourth drive is ownership and possession. When we feel something belongs to us, we want to protect it, improve it and have more. This is common with virtual goods and currencies, but also drives stamp collecting, baseball cards and accumulating money.

It includes abstract aspects too. If you spend a long time personalizing your Facebook profile or *Dropbox* folders, the system feels more like your own and you become attached to it. Even when new technology appears, you may not want to switch because the other system does not feel like yours.

Social influence and relatedness

The fifth drive is social influence and relatedness: things you do because of what other people do. It includes collaboration, competition, group quests and giving gifts.

Relatedness can also involve nostalgia. Seeing a product that reminds you of childhood makes you more likely to buy it. Meeting someone from your hometown makes you more likely to close a deal with them. That connection, that relationship, is important.

Scarcity and impatience

The sixth drive is scarcity and impatience. We want something because we cannot have it or because it is difficult to obtain.

If grapes are on the table, we may not care much and perhaps eat a few. If they are behind glass, out of reach, we cannot stop thinking about them. Can I eat them? When? Why are they in a display case? Are they good?

Facebook used this strategy early on, when facebook.com was only for Harvard students. If you did not attend Harvard, you could not use it. Then access expanded to Harvard, Ivy League institutions and other universities attended by your friends—but you still had not been chosen. Eventually, it opened to more people.

Unpredictability and curiosity

The seventh drive means that, because we do not know what will happen next, we keep thinking about it.

It appears throughout the gambling industry, in slot machines, raffles and lotteries. It also makes us want to finish a book or a film.

Loss

The eighth drive is loss and avoidance.

This is simple: we do something to avoid a loss or prevent something bad from happening. Evidence suggests we are more likely to act to avoid a loss than to achieve a gain, because losses are more painful.

Those are the eight drives. Again, everything we do arises from one of them. Without a drive, there is no motivation.

The most important lesson is to understand human motivation and psychology and apply it to the experience. This is about understanding how the brain becomes interested in stimuli and its surroundings, what excites it, and using empathy to create a better experience, rather than focusing only on technology, functions or features.