It is possible to get addicted to video games, after all. ![]() Playing with your life savings is a far cry from tinkering with avatars on Animal Crossing.įor some people, the line for when, where and how to experiment with gamifying investments and other assets may be murky. In a world where Reddit is a platform for trading advice, and Dogecoin-a cryptocurrency featuring a Shibu Inu from a popular internet meme as its logo-has transcended joke status, there’s plenty of anecdotal evidence of the darker side of the gamification rabbit hole. The gamification trend has come under fire in certain contexts. For instance, embarking on a “ no spend challenge,” competing with your partner to see who spends less in a week or placing bets with your family on how long it will take to fill up a change jar are all forms of gamifying financial tasks. ![]() You can gamify your savings, budget or investments in analog ways, too. Gamification isn’t just a digital tactic. The app, which costs $5 a month after a free trial, offers gamification features including “savings bonuses”-extra cash deposited into users’ accounts based on their average daily balance over a three-month period. Many apps with gamified elements claim pretty significant metrics of success: Digit, for instance, an app that helps people automate their savings, notes on its website that it’s helped users collectively save more than $5 billion. In the financial realm, there are a number of apps and digital services that use gamification to encourage users to save money, budget better or improve financial literacy. Recently, employers have been experimenting with gamification to improve productivity among work-from-home employees. The buzzword crops up in industries ranging from healthcare to recycling to corporate wellness. Gamification has been a trend in the tech world for many years. Gamified apps often employ a “PLB”-points, leaderboards and badges-model to motivate users. The process involves setting goals, tracking progress and hitting milestones to unlock some kind of reward, which may range from cash incentives to new features for a digital avatar. Gamification means creating challenges, competitions and rewards around certain aspects of your life like your carbon footprint or level of hydration. Here’s a quick overview of the trend of gamification, what it means in the context of personal finance and a few ways you can safely apply the psychology of gaming to your spending and saving habits. While there’s a fine line to walk when applying a competitive mindset to money matters, early studies suggest there may be benefits: In 2016, when Walmart rolled out its Mone圜ard prize-linked savings (PLS) program, they found that users ended up saving 35% more on average than the control group. The idea is that people are more likely to meet their savings goals if they can tap into their brain’s reward circuitry via small, incremental and easily achievable “wins.” Now, a slew of platforms are trying to replicate the gamification of physical fitness for financial wellness. ![]() Collectively, those little dopamine hits serve as future motivation to nurture healthy habits. Meeting small, daily goals with help from a device like a Fitbit taps into the brain’s pleasure centers associated with rewards. It’s not rocket science that achieving goals-even little ones like walking 10,000 steps in a day-feels great.
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