Alyssa Alcorn

Developing technology for autism: an interdisciplinary approach

We present an interdisciplinary methodology for designing interactive multi-modal technology for young children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). In line with many other researchers in the field, we believe that the key to developing technology in this context is to embrace perspectives from diverse disciplines to arrive at a methodology that delivers satisfactory outcomes for all stakeholders. The ECHOES project provided us with the opportunity to develop a technology-enhanced learning (TEL) environment that facilitates acquisition and exploration of social skills by typically developing (TD) children and children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). ECHOES’ methodology and the learning environment rely crucially on multi-disciplinary expertise including developmental psychology, visual arts, human–computer interaction, artificial intelligence, education, and several other cognate disciplines. In this article, we reflect on the methods needed to develop a TEL environment for young users with ASDs by identifying key features, benefits, and challenges of this approach.

Supporting the design contributions of children with autism spectrum conditions

In this paper we describe the development of a tool to support the contributions of children with Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC) in a design critique activity. The work is part of the ECHOES project in which we have included children with ASC in a participatory design process to create a technologically enhanced learning environment. We first discuss the general difficulties of involving children with ASC in participatory design work, particularly a socially demanding activity such as design critique. Based on theory from autism research and the results from our own previous design work, we then lay out requirements for a tool to allow children with ASC to become meaningfully involved in a design critique of the ECHOES environment. Subsequently, we describe a prototype of an annotation tool based on these requirements, a pilot study, and feedback elicited from special education teachers. We then report on a study in which seven children with ASC were involved in critiquing a prototype of the ECHOES system using the annotator. In our analysis of the childrens annotator use, we found that it served the intended purposes as a visual support, but also that it was appropriated for other means, such as emotional self-regulation. We discuss examples of these different uses and close by asking how these findings could be applied in other contexts where tools are required to facilitate a discourse in design, rather than directly capture its output.

Social communication between virtual characters and children with autism

Children with ASD have difficulty with social communication, particularly joint attention. Interaction in a virtual environment (VE) may be a means for both understanding these difficulties and addressing them. It is first necessary to discover how this population interacts with virtual characters, and whether they can follow joint attention cues in a VE. This paper describes a study in which 32 children with ASD used the ECHOES VE to assist a virtual character in selecting objects by following the characters gaze and/or pointing. Both accuracy and reaction time data suggest that children were able to successfully complete the task, and qualitative data further suggests that most children perceived the character as an intentional being with relevant, mutually directed behaviour.

Challenges, opportunities and future perspectives in including children with disabilities in the design of interactive technology

In this paper we discuss participatory approaches to designing interactive technologies for children with disabilities. While participatory design (PD) has been increasingly influential in the field of Human-Computer Interaction as a whole, applying its methods and theories to children with disabilities raises challenges specific to this target group and poses more fundamental questions about the limits of PD. We will first build the underlying argument of why we believe PD is particularly important when designing for children with disabilities, before discussing the challenges and opportunities that come with implementing PD in this context. We ground this discussion in our own experiences with developing a learning environment for children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC). We then consider future perspectives and develop research questions by reflecting on our experiences.

Discrepancies in a virtual learning environment: something "worth communicating about" for young children with ASC?

This paper explores the phenomenon of young children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC; aged 5-8 years) detecting discrepancies (i.e. novel or rule-violating occurrences) in a virtual environment (VE), and their subsequent reactions. Analysis of existent video data of 8 children with ASC interacting with the ECHOES VE showed that they detected and reacted to a range of discrepancies. More importantly, these discrepancies motivated a range of positive, social initiations, such as sharing affect, commenting, and social referencing. These early results suggest that deliberately including discrepancies in VEs may motivate initiation for children in this group. However, little is known about the possible types of discrepancies that might exist in a VE, how this population understands them, and how they might practically be incorporated into future designs.

Deliberate System-Side Errors as a Potential Pedagogic Strategy for Exploratory Virtual Learning Environments

This paper describes an exploratory study of system-side errors (i.e. expectation- or rule-violations) in a virtual environment (VE), and the subsequent reactions of young children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC). Analysis of existing video from 8 participants interacting with the ECHOES VE showed that they frequently detected and reacted to system-side errors, engaging in social and communicative behaviours targeted by ECHOES. Detecting errors requires children to compare the VE’s state to their “mental model” of its behaviour, determining where the two are discrepant. This is equivalent to learners identifying mistakes in their own knowledge and then re-aligning with the system-as-expert. This paper explores the implications of these results, proposing a taxonomy of discrepant event types, and discussing their location with respect to the learner and/or system. In addition to considering these results’ significance for this user group and context, it relates the research to existing work that uses erroneous examples.

Discrepancy-detection in virtual learning environments for young children with ASC

This PhD project lays the groundwork for a future VLE that adaptively introduces discrepancies (i.e. novel or rule-violating occurrences) in order to support young children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC) in practicing foundational social skills. This paper suggests a taxonomy of discrepancy types and briefly summarises a completed analysis of discrepancy-detection in existing video data from 8 children with ASC using the ECHOES VLE. It then describes planned future work, which will explore possible types of discrepancies for exploratory social content (as present in ECHOES) and address other key questions about how they might impact this group of learners, and be incorporated into the design of a future VLE. It also considers how the current work relates to existing literature on metacognition and use of erroneous worked examples in tutoring systems.