Modelado y gestión de la motivación en sistemas computacionales

Resumen

In the development of this thesis, motivation is focused as the main theme, it will deal with the modeling and management of motivation in computer systems. Motivation is defined in many ways by different authors, it has been defined by (Woolfolk, 2006) as an internal state that activates, directs and maintains the behavior of the person towards specific goals or ends. For this reason, motivation is identified as an important characteristic in people's lives, a motivated person can achieve the goals that he sets out with a higher probability of success. One of the main objectives of the thesis is to know from a motivational point of view each user and that a computer system is capable of extracting this motivational information automatically. To do this, in the first place, a general motivational model has been defined that represents the different motivational characteristics of a person, in this process a study of the different motivational contributions has been carried out in the literature in this regard and a motivational model formed by two motivational strategies that are the modeling of motivational traits and a player profile based on the gamification strategy. Once this motivational model has been defined, the next step has been to define a motivational diagnostic test in the form of a video game that is capable of extracting the motivational model of users through an objective behavior test. The results obtained from the test carried out with real users show a great capacity for motivational modeling of the diagnostic test, the results related to the modeling of motivational traits being more conclusive. On the other hand, and following the same objective, another motivational diagnostic test has been defined aimed at people over 75 years of age, applying a set of adaptations and design methods focused on this group to ensure that the diagnostic test is adapted to the needs of older people 75 years. There are two reasons for carrying out this part of the research, firstly, because the researchers have prior knowledge based on working with people over 75 years of age, they know that this group of people have a series of different needs than a younger audience, and they need these adaptations so that the diagnostic test can be performed by them. And, secondly, that all the work that has been generated in the thesis is intended to be applied to a research project called Active-UP (PID2019-108408RB-C21) and that it consists of a personalization system to improve patient adoption of frail and pre-fral older adults in the Region of Madrid which is more than 75 years old. The results obtained in the test carried out with real users show that it is a great first approach to motivational modeling of users, but that it is necessary to continue refining the diagnostic test for this particular group. The second block of the thesis focuses on motivation management in computer systems which has been modelled previously. At present, a large number of applications or computer systems have been identified that have a clear objective focused on the achievement of the different objectives of the users, such as playing sports, quitting smoking or performing all the sessions of a health rehabilitation, etc., but that lack motivational support for their users. This leads to a number of users not completing their objectives and abandoning their goals to be achieved. And those systems that do have a motivational support included are very strict and context-dependent and, therefore, very difficult to reuse in other types of systems. Once the problem has been identified and with the aim of filling this gap, a motivational software architecture has been designed that is capable of giving motivational support to a large number of applications in the form of an independent module that only specialises in motivation. This architecture has as a cornerstone a motivational ontology, which stores all the information and models the knowledge of the different motivational contexts of the users in any type of software application. The ontology defines the modelling and management of motivation in the system and allows the personalisation of motivation according to the needs of the users and their performance throughout the programme to achieve their objectives. The ontology has three levels of specialization when it comes to modelling the different motivational scenarios, it allows modelling the Motivational Ontology in a generic way, the specialized Ontology for a specific change programme and, finally, the specialized Ontology for a user of a change programme. The architecture has been defined in a generic way to allow its use in any type of activity, field of study or area of application. The architecture offers a system for configuring the motivational module that allows the management of user motivation in the architecture to be personalised through different options. The creation of this architecture is considered an advance in the definition and management of motivation in computer systems.