The University of West Bohemia brought home an award from Athens.

Can an app that uses game-like quests increase young people’s motivation and mental well-being? And how could such a tool be used in psychology and education? This was the topic of a presentation by FST doctoral student Petr Breit at a conference in Greece.

A well-designed app that incorporates gamification elements can be a meaningful tool for promoting mental well-being, provided it is based on users' real needs. This is the conclusion of a study in which Petr Breit, a young programmer and first-year doctoral student in the Industrial Engineering and Management program at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, participated. At the Research & Innovation Forum in Athens in April, Breit presented a study focusing on the impact and significance of the self-development app XP-life. The Pilsen student worked on both the app's development and the study itself alongside Eliška Rohlíková and Jakub Staněk from the University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice. For their research, the team received the Emerging Ideas Award in Greece.

"In our research, we focused on whether and how the app can support the subjective mental well-being of young people, which of its features are most beneficial to Generation Z, and how similar digital tools can be used in psychology and education," said Petr Breit. The study by the three students used semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire focused on users of the XP-life app. The app is designed to add gaming elements to people's lives, motivate them to reflect on their daily activities, help them find balance, and support personal growth. The authors drew inspiration from RPG games; the app thus allows users to track their progress, level up, and discover their potential. XP-life had already achieved success in 2025 at the International Student Psychology Days in Bratislava, where it won 3rd place in both the Czech and international sections.

"This is a web application built on the SvelteKit framework, designed to gamify everyday life. It functions as a tool for tracking daily tasks referred to as 'quests', which are divided into individual categories. For each task, the user chooses the difficulty level. For completing a daily task, the user earns points that gradually increase the level of the given skill and, at the same time, the overarching trait under which the task falls," explained Breit. In addition to daily tasks, users can set long-term quests to earn more points, such as passing a college exam. In the future, additional game elements are planned, such as expanded quests or a "rank system," which categorizes players into performance groups based on their skills and results.

In Athens, the University of West Bohemia was represented not only by the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering but also by representatives from the Faculty of Education (FPE) and the Department of Lifelong and Distance Learning (CŽV). This year's conference was subtitled Beyond Disruption: Redefining Innovation & Competitiveness in the Context of (Twin) Transition. "Our participation demonstrated that the integration of technical, educational, and research topics has a solid place in the international arena. In addition to the award, it also brought new contacts, the sharing of experiences, and confirmation that interdisciplinary cooperation across faculties and institutions makes sense," summarized Petr Hořejší, supervisor of Petr Breit from the Department of Industrial Engineering at FST. The University of West Bohemia in Pilsen presented topics linking innovation, education, and the societal impacts of new technologies. FPE Vice-Dean Lucie Rohlíková spoke about how generative AI is transforming scientific communication and academic work. Filip Sedlačko from CŽV presented experiences from the launch of a special study program that allows selected courses to be opened to interested members of the public as well.