Around a month ago, I posted up three QR codes around the schoolhouse, each with different prompts to scan. I wanted to practice my hobby in game development while also using the games as a sort of social experiment around campus. The code around the bagel stand had the prompt of “ENTER TO WIN” (in bold comic sans), the one near the forum just outside of the library had no prompt, and the one on the top floor of the schoolhouse had the prompt “SCAN HERE” with an arrow pointing downwards to the QR code. Each of them had a small video game that I made and posted on itch.io as well as a small survey that asked for your form number and why you clicked on the QR code. If you want to play the games themselves, you can go to the following three websites:

https://notsopro.itch.io/qr-game-1 

https://notsopro.itch.io/qr-game-2 

https://notsopro.itch.io/qr-game-3 

Here was the concept for the project:

The QR codes have three levels of engagement. The first check is to see if the user even scans the code in the first case, in which itch.io automatically sees how long the average user is on the project and whether they just look at the game or actually play it. From there, the second check is actually to see if the user enters the form, not if they play the game, since itch.io on mobile shows the description of the game before the game window. The last check is to see if the user plays the game itself, which is to test if the average user will get bored before they exit the page.

Here’s the data: Around 150 people played the game over the course of around 3 weeks (the free trial for the QR code app was 20 days, so after that period, the codes died out). Out of those 150 people, one person played the embedded game and two people answered the form, both of which scanned the code in the forum. Of the people that immediately left the website, the average retention time for the website was around seven seconds.

This is hilarious. The fact that the average Groton student stayed on the site for a mere seven seconds and then left, deciding that neither the form nor the game was worth their time is amazing. For context, the average attention span of a goldfish is around nine seconds.

However, there are definitely a few things that affected these results. First, there were a lot of variables assigned with these codes. Since they were in very dense and usually populated areas of the schoolhouse, it’s possible that students simply did not see the codes and kept going along their way, especially with the explanation for the retention time that some students probably had to go to a class when they saw the qr code, leaving them with no time to actually see the website completely. Additionally, it’s difficult to put up a code in a place that is completely neutral to all forms, so I tried to put them in very public areas of the schoolhouse (the bagel stand and the forum), but the top floor of the schoolhouse is generally dominated by Fourth Formers, so that may have affected some of the results.

Overall, the results were the same. The average Groton student tends to not look up and see what’s around them, and in the rare times that they do, it tends to be for a very brief amount of time. To those who are reading this, either having scanned the codes and playing, leaving immediately, or those who didn’t even see the codes to begin with, try observing your surroundings. You never know what you might find.