A Little “Edutainment” Goes a Long Way: Leveraging Among Us®,a Popular Multiplayer Game,to Teach Persuasion Virtually

Abstract

Challenged by COVID-19, we sought ways to increase engagement in the virtual classroom, capitalizing on a popular multiplayer game to teach persuasion to undergraduate students. In the game Among Us ® , players (“Crewmates”) work together to repair their spaceship before it explodes while being attacked by other players (“Impostors”). The structure of the game lends itself to the use of persuasion and influence tactics and provides the basis for a fun, applied learning activity, designed to take 1 hour. We provide detailed instructions for preparing students for the game, running the game, and debriefing. While the constraints resulting from COVID-19 inspired the adoption of this activity for the classroom, we believe it can work well in both virtual and face-to-face classrooms.

Keywords

persuasion power influence group activity game virtual online

Forced to quickly pivot to online activities due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, we initially had difficulty finding an existing experiential exercise that was (a) centered on persuasion tactics, (b) suitable for an interactive, virtual group, and (c) could be delivered within a single class period. Imagine our delight when we realized that the multiplayer online game Among Us ® by Innersloth, which rose dramatically in popularity during the pandemic, met all three of these criteria!¹ In this article, we provide instructions for using Among Us to teach persuasion in a synchronous virtual setting to undergraduates. This game could also be used in an in-person classroom setting and at the graduate level.² To date, we have facilitated this activity with undergraduates at our respective universities with several classes each (multiple groups per class) across two academic terms. The exercise and debrief are designed to take an hour (not including coverage of power and influence frameworks, which can be done via readings and/or a separate short lecture).

Theoretical Foundation

The topic of persuasion is firmly entrenched within the management curriculum, frequently covered in courses such as principles of management, organizational behavior, leadership, power and politics, and negotiation. A variety of frameworks are used to teach persuasion in the classroom; we focus on two of the more prominent: French and Raven’s (1959) Bases of Power and Yukl and Tracey’s (1992) Nine Influence Tactics. French and Raven’s framework outlines six distinct sources of power that people may have at their disposal as the result of situational and personal characteristics: legitimate power, reward power, coercive power, expert power, information power, and referent power (see Table 1). Yukl and Tracey’s framework is behavioral and outlines nine distinct tactics that people can use when attempting to influence others: rational persuasion, inspirational appeals, consultation, ingratiation, personal appeal, exchange, coalition tactics, pressure, and legitimating tactics (see Table 2).

Table 1.

French and Raven’s (1959) Bases of social power.

Bases of power	Description
Legitimate power	Power that comes from one’s organizational role or position
Reward power	The ability to grant a reward, such as an increase in pay, a perk, or an attractive job assignment (tends to accompany legitimate power)
Coercive power	The ability to take something away or punish someone for noncompliance
Expert power	Power that comes from knowledge and skill
Information power	Power that is distinguished by access to specific information
Referent power	Power that stems from the personal characteristics of the person (charisma; how much do we like or respect them)

Table 2.

Yukl and Tracey’s (1992) Influence Tactics.

Influence tactic	Description
Rational persuasion	Rational persuasion includes using facts, data, and logical arguments to try to convince others that your point of view is the best
Inspirational appeals	Inspirational appeals seek to tap into our values, emotions, and beliefs to gain support for a request or course of action
Consultation	Consultation involves asking others for help in directly influencing or planning to influence another person or group
Ingratiation	Ingratiation is an attempt to make others feel good about themselves in the hopes that they will be more amenable to you
Personal appeals	Personal appeal involves leveraging personal relationships, hoping that if someone likes you, they will help you
Exchange	Exchange refers to give-and-take in which you do something for someone, and they do something for you in return
Coalition tactics	Coalition tactics refer to a group of individuals working together toward a common goal to influence others. It is similar to consultation, but requires all parties to share a goal
Pressure	Pressure refers to exerting undue influence on someone to do what you want or else something undesirable will occur
Legitimating tactics	Legitimating tactics involve an appeal that is based on legitimate or position power

These two frameworks are inherently related, since power is defined as the potential to exert influence on others (French & Raven, 1959). Depending on the sources of power that a person has, particular influence tactics are going to be more appropriate or likely to work. For example, people who have information power (access to specific information) are likely to be able to use rational persuasion based on facts, whereas someone who does not have information power would have to rely on other tactics. Therefore, the ability to recognize one’s sources of power and identify the influence tactics that are most likely to be effective in a given context hinges on understanding the linkages between these two frameworks. See the slides posted as Supplemental Materials for more details on each framework.

Concepts come alive when lectures are accompanied by experiential activities such as games (D. A. Kolb, 2014; A. Y. Kolb & Kolb, 2005). Game-based learning has a positive impact on cognitive, behavioral, and affective learning outcomes (Vlachopoulos & Makri, 2017). Games have been shown to engage students, reinforce learning, and increase their motivation (Burguillo, 2010; A. Y. Kolb & Kolb, 2005; Plump & Meisel, 2020) and, as a side benefit, can increase a sense of connection and trust in virtually distributed teams (Depping et al., 2016). They also provide an opportunity for equal-status interactions among students, supporting the creation of an equitable learning environment (Cohen, 2000; Richard, 2017). Yet, compared with other topics like teamwork and leadership, experiential activities centered on persuasion are rare. In our review of the 109 Management Teaching Review articles covering experiential activities from its inception through January 2021, we found just four articles that had persuasion, influence, or power as keywords. In this article, we contribute a fun, interactive approach to developing students’ capacities to understand the linkages between power and influence using the game Among Us.

Learning Objectives

This activity is meant to be used in conjunction with readings and/or a lecture on the concepts and frameworks of power and persuasion. After participating in this exercise, students will be able to:

Identify the sources of power available in a particular context (focusing on French and Raven’s typology);

Assess, select, and implement influence tactics (focusing on Yukl and Tracy’s tactics) that are most likely to be effective given the available sources of power;

Evaluate the effectiveness of one’s own and others’ use of influence tactics; and

Connect the availability and effectiveness of particular influence tactics back to one’s sources of power.

Given the experiential nature of this activity, students get immediate feedback on their assessment, selection, and implementation of their influence tactics by how they perform in the game and by the commentary shared by their peers during the debrief. They also learn in real-time from observing the results of others’ choices.

Beyond its utility as an exercise to teach persuasion, Among Us can be used as a fun icebreaker to get students talking and build a shared experience. Games like this can help break down barriers and build trust and cohesion among students, particularly in a virtual environment (Depping et al., 2016).

Instructions for Running the Exercise

Among Us is an online, multiplayer competitive game by Innersloth LLC (2016) for four to 10 players, described as “a game of teamwork and deception.” The game is set on a spaceship, with players automatically assigned to roles of “Crewmate” or “Imposter.” It falls into the category of social deduction games, in which players try to determine other players’ hidden roles. The game iterates between gameplay and meetings. During gameplay, Crewmates complete sets of assigned tasks and Imposters attempt to sabotage the ship and kill the Crewmates. During meetings, players can accuse others of being Imposters, deliberate, and vote off suspected Imposters. (See Appendix A for game details.)

The meetings provide an opportunity for students to practice using and observing persuasion and influence tactics, which make this game an excellent experiential learning activity for this topic. In particular, players accused of being an Imposter (whether innocent or guilty) will try to persuade others of their innocence, and all players will similarly try to persuade others to indict suspects (Appendix A provides examples of what these exchanges might look like in practice).

Tables 3 and 4 provide instructions for preparation and facilitation of this activity. We provide instructions for debriefing a synchronous virtual class below (and provide additional debrief details in Appendix B). Appendix C describes extensions to additional topics. Appendix D describes variations. Appendix E provides preparation instructions for students. Appendix F describes recommended game settings.

Table 3.

Game Preparation Instructions.

Step	Task
1.	Familiarize yourself with the game. It is not necessary for an instructor to be an expert in playing Among Us to effectively use this activity. In fact, neither of us had played the game prior to the first time we facilitated the exercise! However, basic familiarity with the game and how it is played will help during the debrief. (See Appendix E.)
2.	Choose Game Hosts. A week or two before the activity is planned, survey the students to find out who has played Among Us, as well as their level of experience with the game (novice, familiar, expert, etc.). Use this information to determine who you will ask to be Game Hosts. In addition to playing, Game Hosts will be in charge of setting up their games and fielding technical questions from novices during play.^a
3.	Encourage (or require) students to practice. In our experience, novices need the upfront practice to be as engaged as the students already familiar with Among Us. We recommend that instructors provide guidance for how to prepare, including how to download the game and use the “freeplay” training mode, at least a week before the activity. Student preparation should take no more than 30 minutes. (See Appendix E for recommended practice instructions.)
4.	Form breakout groups. We recommend aiming for groups of 8–10 players. Each group will need a Game Host (see Step 2). If you have asked about students’ experience with the game, we recommend spreading the more experienced players evenly across the groups rather than just randomly assigning the groups. We also highly recommend instructors pay attention to gender, race, ethnicity, and age so that a diverse pool of Game Hosts is selected; we feel it is critically important that our classrooms do not equate leadership with being white and male, and for our classroom activities to counteract the societal norm of white men as de facto leaders (Eagly & Chin, 2010; Richard, 2017; Rosette et al., 2008).
5.	Introduce persuasion and influence frameworks. Depending on the format of your course, you may choose to synchronously present persuasion and influence frameworks or to assign readings or video lectures prior to the activity. Either way, students should be exposed to persuasion frameworks prior to playing the game, so they can apply what they have learned in their interactions and observations with others. We provide slides or handouts with the contents of Tables 1 and 2 for students to use as a reference during the game and debrief. (See also the Supplemental Materials.)

In our classes, around 50% of students had played before. However, even if no students have played before it should not be a problem with adequate preparation. The game hosts would just need to be willing to put extra care into preparation to ensure they are comfortable with how to set up a game if they have not done so previously.

Table 4.

Game Facilitation Instructions.

Step	Task
1.	Review the Game Plan with the students. Explain that once they are in their breakout rooms, their Game Host will invite them to join an online private game and provide the unique code needed to join. Instruct them to keep their cameras on during the activity to enrich discussions (rather than just using the text-based chat within the game). This enables them to better assess the use of influence tactics by other players. We also recommend reminding students to pay attention to which influence tactics they are using and that are being used by others. Let them know how much time they have to play and that you will call them back to provide post-game debrief instructions. Sample instruction slides are provided in the Supplemental Materials.
2.	Set up breakout rooms. At the start of the activity, set up the breakout rooms as you normally would (e.g., Zoom, Google Meet, etc.).
3.	Play! Once in breakouts, each Game Host sets up an online private game and shares the unique game code with their group. The amount of time given to play Among Us can be as little as 15 minutes. We recommend allowing 30 minutes if possible so that students can play two or three games. In some cases, students played as many as five games in 30 minutes. See Appendix F and the Supplemental Materials for our recommendations on game settings.
4.	Debrief. After the allotted time for game play, call students back, provide debrief instructions, and provide links to the debrief materials. Ideally, allow 30 minutes for the debrief.

Instructions for Debriefing the Exercise

There is flexibility in terms of the debrief strategy, depending on a given instructor’s approach to teaching power, persuasion, and influence. In the virtual environment, we find that allowing the groups to debrief among themselves and then to return to a large group creates a higher level of engagement than an all-class debrief. Prior to the group debrief, we recommend giving students 2 minutes to individually write out their responses to the prompts below to give them time to think about their experiences before engaging with others. To create accountability, we set up a shared space using Google Slides (see the Supplemental Materials for a slide deck containing debrief instructions which could be used in a shared format of the instructor’s choice) where each team discusses and then documents their thoughts with respect to the following three questions:

1. What sources of power did you have during this activity? Which didn’t you have? Why?

2. Which influence tactics did you try or did you observe?

3. Which influence tactics were unlikely to work in this game and why?

Give groups 10 to 15 minutes to discuss and document their answers to these questions within the shared space. Since we are able to see their progress within the slides, we can join rooms that appear to be struggling, and adjust the time to match the students’ progress.

We recommend a 15-minute, full class wrap-up to recap and reinforce the takeaways. We use the three questions from the breakout rooms, which connect back to the Learning Objectives, as the structure for the final wrap-up.

We recommend including a discussion of how situations constrain behavior due to sources of power. Possible questions include: Was this realistic? What kinds of workplace situations have similar contexts to this game? How do the typical workplace opportunities for persuasion and influence differ from this experience?

Given that deception is a necessary component of Among Us, we recommend concluding the debrief with a discussion of the ethical considerations surrounding the use of deception and persuasion tactics. Both trust and transparency are by design undermined in Among Us; yet both are necessary conditions for successful, ethical relationships (see the Debriefing Guide in Appendix B).

Conclusion

While management educators cover persuasion and influence across a variety of courses, experiential activities on these topics are rare, particularly relative to other topics like teamwork, leadership, and negotiation. Among Us gave us a way to bring to life the various sources of power and persuasion tactics.

Among Us, like many other experiential activities, allowed us to reinforce the readings and make connections to other topics. But, importantly, it was truly a gift for our classroom communities. That the students had fun is something that we do not want to undervalue; in the middle of a pandemic and civil unrest, the students appreciated the opportunity to work together on something silly and fun, to laugh, and to connect in small groups. Student engagement during the activity and during the debriefs was high. A little “edutainment” went a long way.

Supplemental Material

sj-pptx-1-mtr-10.1177_23792981221104197 – Supplemental material for A Little “Edutainment” Goes a Long Way: Leveraging Among Us®, a Popular Multiplayer Game, to Teach Persuasion Virtually

Supplemental material, sj-pptx-1-mtr-10.1177_23792981221104197 for A Little “Edutainment” Goes a Long Way: Leveraging Among Us®, a Popular Multiplayer Game, to Teach Persuasion Virtually by Esther Sackett and Lisa M. Amoroso in Management Teaching Review

Footnotes

Appendix A

Appendix B

Appendix C

Appendix D

Appendix E

Appendix F

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the Women of Organizational Behavior Facebook group, whose supportive community facilitated this collaboration.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Esther Sackett

Supplemental material is available at

Notes

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Supplementary Material

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