More than 300 million people use the gamified mobile-assisted language learning (MALL) application (app) Duolingo. The challenging tasks, reward incentives, systematic levels, and the ranking of users according to their achievements are just some of the elements that demonstrate strong gamification elements within this popular language learning application. This application's pervasive reach, flexible functionality, and freemium business model has brought significant attention to gamification in MALL. The present systematic review aims to summarize different methods, frameworks, settings, and research samples used to assess Duolingo's design and impact on various learning outcomes. We carried out a complete database search for articles focused on the issues of design, application, and pedagogies in the use of Duolingo. Three hundred and sixty-seven records were initially found, and 35 of those were selected for final inclusion based on language choice, theoretical frameworks, design, sampling, data collection, and analyses (see Appendix 1 for full list). The results indicated that the majority of research from 2012-2020 was design-focused, quantitative in nature, and used non-probability sampling methods. The focus on app design marks an emphasis on the creation of tools rather than the process and outcomes of language learning from using these tools. Additional results revealed preferences for performance-based research questions, for English as language of choice in research, and for the USA as the most prominent context for Duolingo research studies. Furthermore, our review highlights research gaps specific to Duolingo, yet generalizable to other MALL applications. The results are useful to researchers seeking to assess, evaluate, and understand MALL, gamification, and Duolingo as well as to practitioners interested in utilizing MALL in formal and informal learning environments.

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This article outlines links between cybernetics and psychology through the black box metaphor using a tripartite narrative. The first part explores first-order cybernetic approaches to opening the black box. These developments run parallel to the decline of radical behaviorism and advancements in information processing theory and neuropsychology. We then describe how cybernetics migrates towards a second-order approach (expanding and questioning features of first-order inquiry), understanding applications of rule-based tools to sociocultural phenomena and dynamic mental models, inspiring radical constructivism, and also accepting social constructivism. Psychology, however, enters the cognitive revolution, adhering to the computer metaphor of first-order cyberneticians to streamline human consciousness. The article concludes by outlining how second-order cybernetic approaches emerging in the 1990s may provide cues to psychologists to adopt mixed methods, and bioecological models in the information age, uniting understandings of observable human activity, inner perceptions, and physiological processes across contexts to understand consciousness.

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