Digital game playing habits of graphic design students and the factors afecting their game choices

Today´s university students spend the majority of their time interacting with digital technologies. Their intensive interaction with digital environment also increases their interest in digital games. Graphic design is one of the areas in which especially computers are frequently used as a digital environment. Computers provide great convenience for today´s graphic designers through various software elements for design, and efficient use of computer is required in order to be able to create a good design. Digital games, which include the elements of sound, music, color, illustration, animation and video, attract the attention of Graphic Design students. The general objective of this research is to determine the extent of the relation the students build with their area while they are playing or choosing games, ant to discover the effect of their playing habits and choices on their performance in the courses such as illustration, animation, typography, and web design. Other points to be examined in addition to this include the contribution of the challenges the Graphic Design students face during the games on learning the computer programs for design, how much knowledge they have in relation to the game sector, and whether they plan to work in the game sector after graduation. The acquired data will be analyzed according to the independent variables of gender and class level, and the findings will be compared. The target population of the study will comprise of 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd and 4^th grade students who receive Graphic Design education at Gazi University and play games. As all the students will be included in the study, the target population will be studied and no sample selection will be carried out. The opinions of the Graphic Design students that play games will be acquired through a data collection questionnaire to be developed by the researcher. The capability of the questionnaire to collect valid and reliable data wil- be tested through necessary analyses. The acquired data will be analyzed through qualitative and quantitative data analysis methods.