Serious Games for English Language Learning: A scoping review

Abstract

There is a growing need to learn English motivated by international communication, as serious games being an educational resource that can contribute to respond to this need. Thus, the aim of this study is to know the current state of the literature on the use of serious games for English language learning, focusing the research questions on the evolution of publications and their impact, the most productive authors and journals in terms of the number of publications, and the specific topics addressed. Thus, a scoping review has been carried out, in which scientific articles published between 2020-2024 have been included and searches have been performed in the databases and repositories Scopus, Web of Science, IEEE Xplore, ERIC, ProQuest, ScienceDirect and ACM Digital Library. Starting with 1071 publications, seventy-seven publications were selected after applying the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The results indicate a fluctuation in the number of publications per year, achieving its peak in 2022 and 2024. Likewise, the preponderance of studies in Higher Education, the few studies in Early-Childhood Education and the lack of focus on the writing and oral interaction skills can also be highlighted. Based on the results, we can conclude that should be more scientific focus on the writing and oral interaction skills. In this sense, the study allows advanced research on the use of serious games for teaching English, gathering publications from any educational stage, as well as from the last five years, allowing us to know the current situation of this field of study.