Long-term financial planning is crucial, especially as society ages.  Research from City University London suggests that games with psychological goals could make people 20% more likely to reach their saving goals.

The study shows that by using elements from games, such as leaderboards, progress bars, and badges, people were more likely to achieve the saving goal they had set for each month.

“The start of the year presents an ideal opportunity to motivate ourselves into good habits such as avoiding unnecessary spending and sticking to our saving goals,” the researchers say. “This study shows that associating small but immediate psychological rewards to the act of saving can improve our ability to achieve important and rewarding goals for the future.”

Delayed gratification

The authors explain that people can often struggle to save sufficient amounts because they prefer the immediate gratification that comes from spending money to the delayed gratification from saving it.

They recruited 331 volunteers who were divided into two groups, both of which were required to set a specific saving goal for the next month.  Their progress was then tracked using an app for the next month.  One of the groups was assigned to a gamified version whereas the other group was not.

The savings rate of the two groups were then compared at the end of the month, with the results revealing that those in the gamified group had saved around 20% more in relation to their personal goal than their peers in the non-gamified group.

The researchers believe that their results illustrate the power of gamification to help us save more effectively, and hope that app-based banks, such as Revolut, start to introduce such features to their apps to help consumers achieve their financial goals.

“Banks and application designers often have it in their power to introduce elements such as leaderboards and progress bars, with these psychological stimulants boosting how much we save for our future endeavors—be it buying a house or saving for that dream holiday,” they explain.

There has already been the successful use of gaming elements in other domains, such as in the language learning app Duolingo, or fitness app Zombie Run.  These apps use game elements to provide regular psychological rewards.

“We can placate our present selves by experiencing pleasurable psychological responses typical of games such as mastery, competition, and escapism,” the authors conclude. “These experiences make adhering to long-term goals more immediately enjoyable and therefore help consumers to achieve them.”