Two motivational approaches are accepted by the human which is intrinsic and extrinsic motivation [ 14 ]. According to SDT, there are three types of psychological needs that are competence, autonomy and relatedness which can intrinsically motivate people [ 14 ] in their PA promotion. Competence is the sense of being able to finish an activity, e.g. after the breakfast and lunch period at the office, walking for 10 minutes. Autonomy refers to the feelings of having the choice to view one’s social environment and enabling selections corresponding to complete an activity, e.g. the ability to go for a 10-minute walking with colleagues or alone. Relatedness is the ability to connect with others, e.g. to stay connected with other colleagues using a PA application. Employees are motivated intrinsically when they sense happy while doing activities whereas more extrinsically motivated employees perform the activity because they want to achieve to some degree from completing the activity, for example, earning badges/points after walking for 10 minutes after the breakfast/lunch period. The employees who are not interested in doing any activities are regarded as amotivated.

Gamification is defined as the use of game design elements in non-gaming environments [ 4 ]. Gamification refers to motivating users by making their experience more playful and fun [ 15 ]. According to the theory of motivation [ 16 ], human behaviour is principally motivated by extrinsic factors for example incentive or reward [ 16-17 ]. The reward is offered to “an individual as a result of the accomplishment of a specific task or the achievement of a target behaviour” [ 18 ]. Within the domain of persuasive technology research, reward acts as the construct to measure how fit the reward as a persuasive approach can persuade individuals to perform a target behaviour. The reward can be implemented as virtual points and badges etc. [ 18 ].

Moreover, competition is a persuasive approach that delivers from the Theory of Competition [ 19 ]. Competition refers to “the act of seeking or endeavoring to gain what another is endeavoring to gain at the same time” [ 20 ]. Within the domain of persuasive technology research, competition acts as the construct to measure how fit the competition as a persuasive approach can persuade individuals to perform a target behaviour. In the persuasive applications, Competition can be implemented as a leaderboard on which users’ performance is demonstrated [ 21 ]. Competition allows users to know their position, view and compares their performance of a target behavior by means of the performance of others [ 22 ].

Out of the game elements found in the literature, we selected some possible game elements. In general, empirical research has found that the implementation of reward i.e. points and badges and leaderboards is a practical means to encourage users’ behaviour in nongame contexts [ 23 ]. Specifically, within the PA research, the game elements reward i.e. points and badges [ 24-30 ], and leaderboard [ 24-26,28-29 ] can persuade people to accomplish a specific activity such as PA promotion i.e. exercise/walking in the working environment.

The approach used here was a combination of the theoretical concept of SDT, regular game elements (points, badges and leaderboard), and positive and motivating outcomes (exercise and weight control). We utilized the existing Ryan’s SDT theory model of health behavioral change [ 13 ] to scaffolding the proposed system model. Ryan’s SDT theory model indicates that the satisfaction of autonomy, competence and relatedness brings positive outcomes for mental health (higher quality of life, less anxiety, depression and somatization) and physical health (workout/exercise, weight loss, glycemic control, non-smoking medication use, healthier diet and dental hygiene). This study, however, highlighted the physical health elements particularly exercise/walking and weight control (Fig. 1). SDT has been selected as it runs principally as an analysis for psychological level, seeks for the sources and reasons of the individual level of motivation, their thoughts, reactions and emotions. Thus, SDT theory indicated the purpose of motivation to improving motivational progress and wellbeing [ 31 ]. SDT facilitates a gateway to understand the outlines of PArelated behaviour consequences e.g. walking/exercise, the three basic psychological needs and autonomysupportive elements that support the purpose of PA. This effort of SDT helps to conceptualize a system model, for example, our system model for employees to do PA. As an example, we assume a mobile application to which SDT is applied and employees update their daily activities (10 minutes of walking after breakfast/lunch) period. On the application, if the employee selects to go for walking alone which implies their expression of the psychological need autonomy. If the employee chooses to go for walking with others/colleagues, it indicates their expression of the psychological need relatedness. Active peering with others (e.g. display- a leaderboard on the application to perceive others’ accomplishments) implies their expression of the psychological need competence.

We selected extrinsic motivation to use the game elements (e.g. rewards - scoring points and earning badges to monitor the progress of everyday walking after breakfast/lunch period). We integrated the entire sequence of using SDT, autonomy support – psychological needs – self-determination motivation, using these game elements to build an application. For PA promotion such as exercise or weight control, employees monitor their daily achievement when walking after breakfast/lunch period. An example of a milestone is that an employee starts to walk for 20 minutes daily. They divide this task into two parts, i.e. 10 minutes walking after the breakfast period and another 10 minutes walking after the lunch period, and they get rewards (scoring points and earning badges) in return. Similarly, other milestones can be monitored for example positioning 1st, 2nd or 3rd on the leaderboard based on total earned points. Their physical activities can be measured by an application daily to track their walking, and how they prefer to walk (walking with colleagues or walking alone etc.). Data-driven approaches can be used to measure user’s fulfillment of autonomy, competence and relatedness. To do this, an application followed by the system model is expected to record the everyday data of the users’ activities and a comparative analysis of several weeks can be conducted. The application may count how active users are by calculating their earned rewards and their time spent in using the application etc.

UCD is an iterative application design process that focuses on how the users use the application [ 32 ]. It consists of five steps: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test. Empathize is described as the sense of understanding when answering a problem. Define indicates making the sense of information collected from the Empathize step and concludes with a problem statement i.e. a point-of-view (POV). Ideate focuses on creating ideas for designing prototypes that fit users’ recommendations and needs. Examples of ideation are body storming, mind mapping and sketching. Prototype denotes to an initial stage of an application release. This prototype can be a hard copy/paper object or an interactive display in smart devices) to support in creating the final design. Testing confirms that the prototype and result are polished, reconnoitering the needs of the users and clarifying the POV. Multiple ideas were considered to build a prototype by using several game elements. Ideation occurred in this time leading to prototyping to generate the final design. The prototype was then tested by few participants. Eight employees living in the Finland were interviewed face-to-face. Participants were from three nationalities. The purpose of the interview was to perceive employees’ views in relation to their willingness of PA promotion in their office environment. The employees were asked to describe their views and experience of overcoming physical inactivity at the office such as how do they conduct PA when sitting for long-time and thoughts about anything that might motivate them and any technology-mediated tools that might support them to do PA. Six employees (75%) reported the lack of PA in the working environment. Seven employees (88%) strongly recommended for a technological tool to which they can do PA particularly walking and weight control, and connect with others such as the tool can have the option to choose walking alone or walking with others. They wanted to see their daily progress in a leaderboard. They showed their interest to experience something that can make them competitive, for example, lower points holder will appear on the leaderboard with fatty face They showed interest to use the game elements: (scoring points and earning badges -1st, 2nd and 3rd). However, some recommended exchanging the points in real time voucher/gift, for example, a tea/coffee voucher. The above observation has informed us to move to the Define step to come up with an actionable problem statement. Based on the results of the interviews the following problem statement has been concluded:

Employees sense a lack of being physically active in their working environment. A technological tool using game elements can help them overwhelming the state of their physical inactivity and can help them to motivate in walking and tracking everyday walking history.

The above POV has drawn attention on how we might build an application with the aid of game elements to which users can experience more fun in their PA promotion.

The POV from the Define step has led us to design the prototype of the PA application. The idea of designing the prototype was to observe users’ response and how they responded using game elements in accordance with the SDT sequence. The prototype was designed by adding PBL game elements (points, badges and leaderboards).

The objective of building the prototype was to verify whether users can run a gamified persuasive application, and how do they react in using the application that incorporates SDT using game elements. A low fidelity paper prototype (Fig. 2) was built which lets the user to input his/her initial details to log-in (name, age and weight etc.). After logging into the application, the user had the option to go for physical activity with others or alone (Fig. 2). Once a user selects an option to walk, time starts to count for 10 minutes, and the user receives 1 point for every 5 minutes. After the walking session, users can track their tier activities on the leaderboard. 3.3.5 Test Ten Employees had been invited via email/telephone. Out of those, 5 employees confirmed their availability to take part in the study.

The prototype was not interactive i.e. participants used printed paper to access the paper prototype. Each participant had been allocated for 15 minutes to test the prototype. The aim was to observe the usability issues of the prototype, and how users valued to use the SDT sequence using game elements. Employees were informed briefly how to use the prototype, e.g. they had been guided to pretend using the prototype similarly as they were using it in real time. The participants were asked to report whether the prototype motivated them to promote their PA in the working environment. Our intention in this study was to find the qualitative information data of how participants use the prototype and response to the game elements in the prototype. We collected participants’ response that was compelled by qualitative data. The data showed their progress in completing the tasks facilitated by the prototype.