Publications
Our research papers, conference proceedings, and preprints.
Journal Articles
2026
Reliving 10 Years Old: Descriptive Insights into Retro Gaming.
Nick Ballou, Nicholas David Bowman, Thomas Hakman, Andrew K. Przybylski
Psychology of Popular Media · 2026
Self-Determination Theory in HCI: Advancing the Field
Nick Ballou, Dorian Peters, Gabriela Villalobos-Zúñiga, Elisa D Mekler, Rafael A Calvo, Sebastian Deterding
Interacting with Computers · 2026
2025
How Do Video Games Affect Mental Health? A Narrative Review of 13 Proposed Mechanisms.
Nick Ballou, Thomas Hakman, Matti Vuorre, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K. Przybylski
Technology, Mind, and Behavior · 2025
Perceived Value of Video Games, but Not Hours Played, Predicts Mental Well-Being in Casual Adult Nintendo Players
Nick Ballou, Matti Vuorre, Thomas Hakman, Andrew K Przybylski
Royal Society Open Science · 2025
From Social Media to Artificial Intelligence: Improving Research on Digital Harms in Youth
Karen L Mansfield, Sakshi Ghai, Thomas Hakman, Nick Ballou, Matti Vuorre, Andrew K Przybylski
The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health · 2025
Fundamental Flaws in the Design and Reporting of Chew and Neo (2024)
Leon Y. Xiao, Nick Ballou, Charlotte Eben
Trends in Psychology · 2025
2024
Registered Report Evidence Suggests No Relationship Between Objectively-Tracked Video Game Playtime and Wellbeing Over 3 Months
Nick Ballou, Craig Jeffrey Robb Sewall, Jack Ratcliffe, David Zendle, Laurissa Tokarchuk, Sebastian Deterding
Technology, Mind, and Behavior · 2024
The Basic Needs in Games Model of Video Game Play and Mental Health
Nick Ballou, Sebastian Deterding
Interacting with Computers · 2024
The Basic Needs in Games Scale (BANGS): A New Tool for Investigating Positive and Negative Video Game Experiences
Nick Ballou, Alena Denisova, Richard Ryan, C. Scott Rigby, Sebastian Deterding
International Journal of Human-Computer Studies · 2024
Affective Uplift During Video Game Play: A Naturalistic Case Study
Matti Vuorre, Nick Ballou, Thomas Hakman, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K. Przybylski
Games: Research and Practice · 2024
2023
A Manifesto for More Productive Psychological Games Research
Nick Ballou
Games: Research and Practice · 2023
Cross-Cultural Patterns in Mobile Playtime: An Analysis of 118 Billion Hours of Human Data
David Zendle, Catherine Flick, Darel Halgarth, Nick Ballou, Simon Demediuk, Anders Drachen
Scientific Reports · 2023
No Evidence That Chinese Playtime Mandates Reduced Heavy Gaming in One Segment of the Video Games Industry
David Zendle, Catherine Flick, Elena Gordon-Petrovskaya, Nick Ballou, Leon Y. Xiao, Anders Drachen
Nature Human Behaviour · 2023
The Relationship Between Lockdowns and Video Game Playtime: Multilevel Time-Series Analysis Using Massive-Scale Data Telemetry
David Zendle, Catherine Flick, Darel Halgarth, Nick Ballou, Joe Cutting, Anders Drachen
Journal of Medical Internet Research · 2023
2022
“Clinically Significant Distress” in Internet Gaming Disorder: An Individual Participant Meta-Analysis
Nick Ballou, David Zendle
Computers in Human Behavior · 2022
A Community-Sourced Glossary of Open Scholarship Terms
Sam Parsons, Flávio Azevedo, Mahmoud M. Elsherif, Samuel Guay, Owen N. Shahim, Gisela H. Govaart, Emma Norris, Aoife O'Mahony, Adam J. Parker, Ana Todorovic, Charlotte R. Pennington, Elias Garcia-Pelegrin, Aleksandra Lazić, Olly Robertson, Sara L. Middleton, Beatrice Valentini, Joanne McCuaig, Bradley J. Baker, Elizabeth Collins, Adrien A. Fillon, Tina B. Lonsdorf, Michele C. Lim, Norbert Vanek, Marton Kovacs, Timo B. Roettger, Sonia Rishi, Jacob F. Miranda, Matt Jaquiery, Suzanne L. K. Stewart, Valeria Agostini, Andrew J. Stewart, Kamil Izydorczak, Sarah Ashcroft-Jones, Helena Hartmann, Madeleine Ingham, Yuki Yamada, Martin R. Vasilev, Filip Dechterenko, Nihan Albayrak-Aydemir, Yu-Fang Yang, Annalise A. LaPlume, Julia K. Wolska, Emma L. Henderson, Mirela Zaneva, Benjamin G. Farrar, Ross Mounce, Tamara Kalandadze, Wanyin Li, Qinyu Xiao, Robert M. Ross, Siu Kit Yeung, Meng Liu, Micah L. Vandegrift, Zoltan Kekecs, Marta K. Topor, Myriam A. Baum, Emily A. Williams, Asma A. Assaneea, Amélie Bret, Aidan G. Cashin, Nick Ballou, Tsvetomira Dumbalska, Bettina M. J. Kern, Claire R. Melia, Beatrix Arendt, Gerald H. Vineyard, Jade S. Pickering, Thomas R. Evans, Catherine Laverty, Eliza A. Woodward, David Moreau, Dominique G. Roche, Eike M. Rinke, Graham Reid, Eduardo Garcia-Garzon, Steven Verheyen, Halil E. Kocalar, Ashley R. Blake, Jamie P. Cockcroft, Leticia Micheli, Brice Beffara Bret, Zoe M. Flack, Barnabas Szaszi, Markus Weinmann, Oscar Lecuona, Birgit Schmidt, William X. Ngiam, Ana Barbosa Mendes, Shannon Francis, Brett J. Gall, Mariella Paul, Connor T. Keating, Magdalena Grose-Hodge, James E. Bartlett, Bethan J. Iley, Lisa Spitzer, Madeleine Pownall, Christopher J. Graham, Tobias Wingen, Jenny Terry, Catia Margarida F. Oliveira, Ryan A. Millager, Kerry J. Fox, Alaa AlDoh, Alexander Hart, given=Olmo R. family=Akker, Gilad Feldman, Dominik A. Kiersz, Christina Pomareda, Kai Krautter, Ali H. Al-Hoorie, Balazs Aczel
Nature Human Behaviour · 2022
Reforms to Improve Reproducibility and Quality Must Be Coordinated across the Research Ecosystem: The View from the UKRN Local Network Leads
Suzanne L. K. Stewart, Charlotte R. Pennington, given=Gonçalo R. family=Silva, Nick Ballou, Jessica Butler, Zoltan Dienes, Caroline Jay, Stephanie Rossit, Anna Samara, U. K. Reproducibility Network (UKRN) Local Network Leads
BMC Research Notes · 2022
Response to Xiao et al .: If Everything Is a Loot Box, Nothing Is
David Zendle, Paul Cairns, Rachel Meyer, Stuart Waters, Nick Ballou
Addiction · 2022
2021
The Relationship between Mental Well-Being and Dysregulated Gaming: A Specification Curve Analysis of Core and Peripheral Criteria in Five Gaming Disorder Scales
Nick Ballou, Antonius J. Van Rooij
Royal Society Open Science · 2021
A Large-Scale Study of Changes to the Quantity, Quality, and Distribution of Video Game Play during a Global Health Pandemic.
Matti Vuorre, David Zendle, Elena Petrovskaya, Nick Ballou, Andrew K. Przybylski
Technology, Mind, and Behavior · 2021
2020
The Changing Face of Desktop Video Game Monetisation: An Exploration of Trends in Loot Boxes, Pay to Win, and Cosmetic Microtransactions in the Most-Played Steam Games of 2010-2019
David Zendle, Rachel Meyer, Nick Ballou
PLOS ONE · 2020
The Prevalence of Loot Boxes in Mobile and Desktop Games
David Zendle, Rachel Meyer, Stuart Waters, Nick Ballou, Paul Cairns
Addiction · 2020
2019
Conceptualizing an Ideal Computer-Assisted Pronunciation Training System: Educational Technology for L2 Phonetic Features
Nick Ballou
Cambridge Occasional Papers in Linguistics · 2019
Conference Papers
2026
From Breakups to Lethargy: Player Accounts of Third Variables Affecting Video Game Playtime and Wellbeing
Nick Ballou, Tamás Földes, Thomas Hakman, Andrew K Przybylski
Proceedings of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · 2026
2024
How Does Juicy Game Feedback Motivate? Testing Curiosity, Competence, and Effectance
Dominic Kao, Nick Ballou, Kathrin Gerling, Heiko Breitsohl, Sebastian Deterding
Proceedings of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · 2024
2023
Four Dilemmas for Video Game Effects Scholars: How Digital Trace Data Can Improve the Way We Study Games
Nick Ballou, David Zendle, Joe Cutting, Elena Gordon-Petrovskaya
ICA'23 · 2023
‘I Just Wanted to Get It Over and Done With’: A Grounded Theory of Psychological Need Frustration in Video Games
Nick Ballou, Sebastian Deterding
The Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play - CHI PLAY '23 · 2023
Learnings from the Case Maple Refugee: A Story of Free-to-Play, Probability, and Gamer Consumer Activism
Solip Park, Nick Ballou, Maarten Denoo, Eva Grosemans, Elena Petrovskaya, Yaewon Jin, Leon Y. Xiao
DiGRA '23 · 2023
Four Dilemmas for Video Game Effects Scholars: How Digital Trace Data Can Improve the Way We Study Games
David Zendle, Nick Ballou, Joe Cutting, Elena Gordon-Petrovskaya
ICA'23 · 2023
2022
Do People Use Games to Compensate for Psychological Needs During Crises? A Mixed-Methods Study of Gaming During COVID-19 Lockdowns
Nick Ballou, Sebastian Deterding, Ioanna Iacovides, Laura Helsby
CHI '22 · 2022
Self-Determination Theory in HCI : Shaping a Research Agenda
Nick Ballou, Sebastian Deterding, April Tyack, Elisa D Mekler, Rafael A Calvo, Dorian Peters, Gabriela Villalobos Zúñiga, Selen Türkay
CHI '22 Extended Abstracts · 2022
The Hidden Intricacy of Loot Box Design: A Granular Description of Random Monetized Reward Features
Nick Ballou, Charles Takashi Toyin Gbadamosi, David Zendle
Proceedings of DiGRA 2022 · 2022
2021
Are You Open? A Content Analysis of Transparency and Openness Guidelines in HCI Journals
Nick Ballou, Vivek R Warriar, Sebastian Deterding
CHI '21 · 2021
Not Very Effective: Validity Issues of the Effectance in Games Scale
Nick Ballou, Heiko Breitsohl, Dominic Kao, Kathrin Gerling, Sebastian Deterding
Extended Abstracts of the 2021 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play · 2021
Actions, Not Gestures: Contextualising Embodied Controller Interactions in Immersive Virtual Reality
Jack Ratcliffe, Nick Ballou, Laurissa Tokarchuk
Proceedings of the 27th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology · 2021
Preprints
2026
All BANG, Little Buck: Need-Related Experiences Are Weakly Linked with Behavior in the Video Game Domain
Nick Ballou, Tamás Andrei Földes, Matti Vuorre, Thomas Hakman, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K Przybylski
PsyArXiv · 2026 Preprint
Building Collaborative Digital Behavioural Science: A Cross-Sector Agenda from Video Games Research
Sabrina Fay Norwood, Nick Ballou, Tamás Andrei Földes, Thomas Hakman, Karen Mansfield, Matti Vuorre, Yasmin AlJedawi, David Alexander Ellis, Peter James Etchells, Alexandra Evans, George Farmer, Christopher J. Ferguson, James D. Ivory, Linda Katherine Kaye, Maxime Larrieu, Rune Nielsen, Douglas A. Parry, Andrew B. Pattison, Thorsten Quandt, Monta Reinfelde, Hans IJzerman, David Sweeney, Justin Thomas, Leon Y. Xiao, Andrew K Przybylski
PsyArXiv · 2026 Preprint
Awareness and Use of Open Research Practices: An International Survey of Researchers Across Disciplines
Charlotte Rebecca Pennington, Emma Norris, Magda Skubera, Yalige Ba, Ryssa Moffat, Olavo Bohrer Amaral, Matus Adamkovic, Arca Adıgüzel, Rafaela A. Almeida, Jessie Baldwin, Nick Ballou, Luiza Marques Prates Behrens, Michael Bertram, Ingvild Elise Bjerke, Simon Edward Blackwell, Agata Bochynska, Michiel De Boer, Ivan Buljan, Cristian B. Canales-Aguirre, Harry Carey, Vladimira Cavojova, William Peter Cawthorn, Simon Christ, Krzysztof Cipora, Alden F Conner, Federica Paola Conte, Davide Crepaldi, Timothy M. Errington, Emily Kate Farran, Gordon Feld, Raquel Meister Ko. Freitag, Paulina Gebauer, Sarah Gunn, Helena Hartmann, Victoria Hellon, Gabriela Hofer, Malika Ihle, Ayumi Ikeda, Andrew Jones, Sara Graça Jorge, Yusuph A. Kafula, Tamara Kalandadze, Veli-Matti Karhulahti, Halil Emre Kocalar, Malgorzata Lagisz, Margherita Lanz, Félix P. Leiva, Marco Tullio Liuzza, Marcel Martončik, Hiroshi Matsui, Maria Montefinese, David Moreau, David Philip Morgan, Shinichi Nakagawa, Helen Niemeyer, Gustav Nilsonne, Carmen Penido, Sofia Persson, Elena Serena Piccardi, Rima-Maria Rahal, Jakub Rajcani, Ben Ridley, Michele Scandola, Felix D. Schönbrodt, Sandy Schumann, Mojtaba Soltanlou, James Steele, Suzanne L. K. Stewart, Eli S.J. Thoré, Luka Ursić, Michelangelo Vianello, Vootele Voikar, Nicholas C Wu, Yuki Yamada, Cemre Yilmaz, Naoto Yoshimura, Mircea Zloteanu, Marija Franka Žuljević, Marcus Robert Munafo, Kait Clark
PsyArXiv · 2026 Preprint
2025
Open Play: A Longitudinal Dataset of Multi-Platform Video Game Digital Trace Data and Psychological Measures
Nick Ballou, Tamás Andrei Földes, Matti Vuorre, Thomas Hakman, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K Przybylski
PsyArXiv · 2025 Preprint
Claims for No Evidence Also Need Evidence
Veli-Matti Karhulahti, Nick Huntington-Klein, Nick Ballou
PsyArXiv · 2025 Preprint
2024
How Do Video Games Affect Mental Health? A Narrative Review of 13 Proposed Mechanisms
Nick Ballou, Thomas Hakman, Matti Vuorre, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K Przybylski
PsyArXiv · 2024 Preprint
Perceived Value of Video Games, but Not Hours Played, Predicts Mental Well-Being in Adult Nintendo Players
Nick Ballou, Matti Vuorre, Thomas Hakman, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K Przybylski
PsyArXiv · 2024 Preprint
2023
Pinpointing the Problem: Providing Page Numbers for Citations as a Crucial Part of Open Science
Leon Y. Xiao, Nick Ballou
OSF Preprints · 2023 Preprint
The Basic Needs in Games (BANG) Model of Video Game Play and Mental Health
Nick Ballou, Sebastian Deterding
PsyArXiv · 2023 Preprint
Affective Uplift During Video Game Play: A Naturalistic Case Study
Matti Vuorre, Nick Ballou, Thomas Hakman, Kristoffer Magnusson, Andrew K Przybylski
PsyArXiv · 2023 Preprint
2022
Development of the Brief Open Research Survey (BORS) to Measure Awareness and Uptake of Open Research Practices
Emma Norris, Kait Clark, Marcus Robert Munafo, Caroline Jay, Jessie Baldwin, Alexandra Lautarescu, Hugo Pedder, Mike Page, Eike Mark Rinke, Charlotte Burn, William Peter Cawthorn, Nick Ballou, Scott Glover, Samuel Evans, Stephanie Rossit, Mojtaba Soltanlou, Emma Louise Wise, Mark Kelson, Nadia Soliman, Andrew Jones, Rianne Costello, David Smailes, Laura L. Wilkinson, Elena Serena Piccardi, Adam Michael Partridge, Charlotte Hulme, Anna Schultze, Charlotte Rebecca Pennington
MetaArXiv · 2022 Preprint
Understanding Whether Lockdowns Lead to Increases in the Heaviness of Gaming Using Massive-Scale Data Telemetry: An Analysis of 251 Billion Hours of Playtime
David Zendle, Catherine Flick, Darel Hargarth, Nick Ballou, Joe Cutting, Anders Drachen
PsyArXiv · 2022 Preprint
Other Publications
2024
The Basic Needs in Games (BANG) Model of Video Games and Mental Health: Untangling the Effects of Games with Open Science
Nick Ballou
Queen Mary University of London · 2024
2021
ASA Consultation on In-Game Purchasing
Elena Petrovskaya, Nick Ballou, David Zendle
Advertising Standards Authority (UK) · 2021
2020
Loot Boxes in Video Games: Call for Evidence
David Zendle, Nick Ballou, Elena Petrovskaya
Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (UK) · 2020