Week 31 Journal

Date: 25/04/08


This will be the final entry of my blog.


This week I have been helping the team achieve the final team milestone presentation to a high standard. To do this I have been practicing my section as well as providing feedback on other teams members sections.

On Wednesday the team practiced the presentation in front of Claire and Amanda. The feedback from this good with Amanda expressing that presentation was delivered in a professional manner and because of this nothing had to be changed. I also spoke with Claire about my individual report. I will be writing about my interests in mise en scene and how it is applied in video games and how the researched knowledge helped push the project forward.

On Thursday the team delivered the presentation to the supervisory team. This was the final milestone and it was important to deliver a clear presentation as we were showcasing our results. I feel that I delivered my section well, as did the rest of the team.

Finally next week, the team will check the final team report one more time and then print it before handing it in. I will also complete the first draft of my individual report.

Week 30 Journal

Week 30

Date: 20/04/08

Over the weekend of 12th & 13th April, I read through the final team document and highlighted any discrepancies that I felt needed changing. I raised these points on Wednesday to the team and the necessary changes were discussed and amended.

On Wednesday I discussed my ideas for my individual report to Claire. Claire pointed out a few areas that I may wish to concentrate on. I took these points on board and started out planning out the sections of my report.

On Thursday I help construct the final points of the presentation. I was then assigned my section that I would discuss during the presentation.

Over the next week I will be continuing with my individual report, and helping the team deliver the final milestone to a high standard.

Week 29 Journal

Date: 11/04/08

This week the team received feedback on the final team report, and I amended my sections on the advice given. Later on in the week, I helped go through each section to make sure that all amendments were made and the document was up to a high standard.

My focus for the next week will be the individual journal, after learning what is needed in this report I will now go ahead and plan out the different sections.

Week 28 Journal

Week 28 Journal

Date: 04/04/08

Over the last three weeks I have been concentrating on completing the sections that I was assigned to writing in the final team report. The meeting before Easter was very helpful, allowing me to understand how my section could be improved, and these changes were implemented into my Evaluation Approach section. Changes included a flow chart for the testing procedure and the feedback from this proved that it was a lot easier to understand rather then writing the procedure out. I was also assigned with writing the conclusion. When this was written it was decided that it needed a little bit more added to it, as it was not quite right. So due to this I worked with Nick to write a new conclusion.

While the final team write up was taking place I also took the role of assistant editor. This allowed me to check on the sections the team were writing to make sure that the document stayed within the set style of writing. I also suggested some new sections that should be implemented so the document covered all aspects of the project.

With this draft now completed and being checked by Amanda and Claire, this has allowed me to start concentrating on the individual report.

DUE TO THE EASTER BREAK THE NEXT BLOG WILL BE PUBLISHED ON THE 4th APRIL 2008

Week 25 Journal

Week 25

14/03/08

This week has once again concentrated on the statistical analysis of our results. On Tuesday a meeting with Steve Manning was held. I found this to be a very useful meeting as Steve went into more detail as to why we should use the statistical methods that we have chosen. This meeting helped me gain a greater understanding of statistical analysis.

On Wednesday I showed the new structure of the final team document to Amanda and Claire. They seemed happier with the new structure and this now allowed the team to go away and plan their own sections. In the afternoon I assisted the team with making the graphs of our results, to show the supervisors on Thursday. Once we had all the graphs together I made sure that I understood what each one was showing.

Thursday’s Supervisors meeting went well with us showing the graphs and explaining to the supervisors what they all meant and how our conclusions from them can be back up from our statistical analysis. The supervisors gave us all feedback on the graphs, and some interesting questions were raised, such as can SAM be used to measure other emotional responses when playing games.

On Thursday I assisted the team by helping Nick and Phill plan out their sections for the final team report, which is to be written over the Easter break.

I feel that this week has been quite successful as the statistical analysis has shown that most of our data is significant, and with the meeting with Steve Manning it allowed me to see that the data was correct and now the team can go and write about our data in the final team report.

Week 24 Journal

Week 24

07/03/08

The beginning of the week started with me looking through the final team report with Nick, concerns were raised that we felt the document is not written in the correct style but we decided to wait till Wednesday to get feedback from Claire Brierley and Amanda Dewhurst on our first draft.

On Tuesday we continued with testing, after testing around six participants, a team meeting took place to decide that testing should stop to concentrate on the analysis of results, as we knew that analysis of the results would be a hard task using statistical analysis.

On Wednesday a first draft of the final team report was given to Claire Brierley and Amanda Dewhurst, they then gave feedback and confirmed what I had already suspected, that it was written in the wrong style. They gave advice on each section, and for my own section (Evaluation approach) they advised that a flow chart of the testing procedure would look better then a paragraph of writing. I now have a better understanding of what is now needed in the document; one problem was referencing what the team member, but that is no longer needed. So rewriting my section should be a lot easier. From this meeting I went a formed a new structure for the final team document be written in. This will be shown in next Wednesday’s lesson.

On Wednesday afternoon, the team started the analysis of the testing results. This allowed me to start looking at the different method of statistical analysis that Phill had already started looking at.

On Thursday a meeting took place with Dr. John Charlton. This meeting proved very useful as it allowed him to explain the tests that we should use to analyse our test results. He suggested that we use the Wilcoxon signed ranks test to measure the Pleasure-Arousal-Dominance values and the paired T-test to measure the average heart rates. He showed the team how to do these tests in SPSS.

Early indications are showing some good results, and these will be concentrated on next week, before the break for Easter.