Computers as an environment for facilitating social interaction in children with autistic spectrum disorders

Autism is a developmental condition that affects communication, imagination and social interaction. Of these three impairments, it is the last which has the greatest negative impact on the life of children with autism and their families. Different intervention programs have attempted to address social interaction difficulties but there is clearly a need for a school-based program that helps develop social interaction and promote social skills within educationally 'natural' settings.Teachers, parents and researchers widely believe that children with autism enjoy using computers and in most western countries, most children with autism have access to them at home or at school. Drawing from communication theory, this thesis explores the hypothesis that computers can provide a motivating, real-life environment in which social interaction in children with autism can be facilitated.In a series of staged studies, the ways in which computers might be used to facilitate social interaction are investigated. The first phase established the level of access to computers that children with autism typically now have and how educators currently use computers with this group of children. The experience of those working in non-school based programmes aimed at developing social interaction in children with autism was also explored. It was also necessary to explore any inherent constraints on the development of software specifically aimed at children with autism.Having established available resources and constraints, the thesis then explored the social behaviours of children with autism within a computer-based environment, using play-based activities. In a number of interlinking studies, differences and similarities in social interactions were explored when i) working on a paper-based versus computer-based version of the same two player game, ii) playing the same game at the computer, either against a partner or alone, and iii) working with a partner on a series of graded, computer-based jigsaw puzzles, with the partner acting either as a collaborator or competitor.The findings presented illustrate the potential for eliciting increased social interaction in children with autism when working alongside other with computers, and suggest the possibility that time spent with computers by children with autism may help them to gravitate from a solitary activity towards a social one. The relevance of the findings of these studies to practice are discussed and the need for further studies highlighted

Understanding collaborative creativity: An observational study of the effects of the social and educational context on the processes of young children's joint creative writing

Drawing on socio-cultural theory, the research presented here examines the nature of productive group work in the context of children's collaborative creative writing. The thesis explores the role of friendship in mediating the processes of joint creative writing, and examines the effects of other contextual features in the classroom-context - task design, instructions and writing medium - in structuring and supporting shared creativity. The study draws on preliminary observations of Year 5-Year 6 classrooms (children aged 9-11) and longitudinal observational data of ongoing classroom activities in Year 3 and Year 4 classrooms (children aged 7-9) in England. It offers a contextualised, qualitative analysis of the social and cognitive processes linked to shared creative text composition via the in-depth study of verbal interaction. For the analysis of joint creative writing discourse a functional model was developed. The research study contributes to the theoretical debate on collaborative learning by studying peer processes in the context of creative writing and by exploring the mediational role of friends and features in the learning context in influencing classroom-based collaboration. The findings show that the pairs' discourse varied in the level of collectivity and individualism they displayed and that, for most part, the variations can be explained by the differences in their relationships. Thus the study demonstrates the potential affordances of friendship pairing for shared creativity. Furthermore, the research presented in the thesis shows the mediating effects of task design, instructions and the writing medium, highlighting the inextricably linked nature of contextual features in structuring shared work in the classroom

Collaborating around digital tabletops: children’s physical strategies from the UK, India and Finland

We present a study of children collaborating around interactive tabletops in three different countries: the United Kingdom, India and Finland. Our data highlights the key distinctive physical strategies used by children when performing collaborative tasks during this study. Children in the UK tend to prefer static positioning with minimal physical contact and simultaneous object movement. Children in India employed dynamic positioning with frequent physical contact and simultaneous object movement. Children in Finland used a mixture of dynamic and static positioning with minimal physical contact and object movement. Our findings indicate the importance of understanding collaboration strategies and behaviours when designing and deploying interactive tabletops in heterogeneous educational environments. We conclude with a discussion on how designers of tabletops for schools can provide opportunities for children in different countries to define and shape their own collaboration strategies for small group learning that take into account their different classroom practices

Towards a Generalised Pedagogical Framework for Creating Mixed-Mode Role-Play in a 3D Virtual Environment

Role-play has proved itself to be an effective teaching method, and role-play within a virtual environment has been found to be more especially so. Thus, there have been many studies concerned with role-play and computer simulation used together; however, up to this point, limitations may still be found with respect to the work which has been done in this area. Some of the major outstanding problems associated with creating virtual environments for learning are: finding the simplest way to model and represent abstract concepts as 3D objects; and implementing the students’ interactions - with each other, with their instructor, and with the represented objects. Also, many projects have focused on only one pedagogical topic. My vision is to introduce a generalized method that facilitates the construction of learning scenarios and renders them as message-passing role-play activities. Then, these activities could be deployed in a virtual environment (VE) in order to help students to become more immersed in the learning process. Each such activity is to be constructed by humanizing a ‘non-human’ object, whereby the students embody and imitate an (often abstract) object which is part of a technological system and which occurs in a virtual world. This can lead to many benefits, such as being able to better support the students’ ability to imagine and visualize such objects, making them more engaged with their learning, enhancing their conceptual understanding, strengthening their reasoning when solving problems related to the topic area, and reinvigorating their interest in learning. This research presents an evaluation of an approach for the creation of a role-play simulation in a role-play supporting virtual environment, which harnesses the advantages of 3D virtual environments in an effective way - in order to benefit the students’ learning in terms of improving their understanding of abstract concepts. Moreover, this approach is generalized and thus extends the previous studies by offering a system that can be applied to a wide range of topics - that involve message-passing role-play scenarios. The approach is presented within a conceptual pedagogical framework that is supported by an analysis of the findings and results from experiments that were conducted in order to validate the framework from both the learning and technical perspectives

Single Display Groupware: A Model for Co-present Collaboration

ABSTRACT We introduce a model for supporting collaborative work between people that are physically close to each other. We call this model Single Display Groupware (SDG). In this paper, we describe this model, comparing it to more traditional remote collaboration. We describe the requirements that SDG places on computer technology, and our understanding of the benefits and costs of SDG systems. Finally, we describe a prototype SDG system that we built and the results of a usability test we ran with 60 elementary school children

COMPUTER MEDIATED COLLABORATIVE DESIGN IN ARCHITECTURE: THE EFFECTS OF COMMUNICATION CHANNELS ON COLLABORATIVE DESIGN COMMUNIATION

Up till now, architects collaborating with other colleagues did so mostly face-to-face (FTF). They had to be in the same space (co-located) at the same time. Communi-cation was ‘spontaneous’ and ideas were represented, whether verbal or non-verbal, by talking and using ‘traditional drawing tools’. If they were geographically displaced, the interaction was then space affected as well as the probability of being time affected. In this case communication was usually mediated through the tele-phone, and graphically represented ideas were sent by Fax or posted documents. Recently, some architectural firms started using modems and Internet connections to exchange information, by transferring CAD drawings as well as design informa-tion, through e-mail and file transfer protocol (FTP). Discussing ideas in architecture, as a more abstract notion, is different from discuss-ing other more concrete arguments using video conferencing. It is more important to ‘see’ what is being discussed at hand than ‘watch’ the other person(s) involved in the discussion. In other words the data being conveyed might be of more impor-tance than the mode of communication. Taking into consideration recent developments in computer and communication technologies this thesis investigates different communication channels utilised in architectural collaboration through Computer Mediated Collaborative Design (CMCD) sessions as opposed to FTF sessions. This thesis investigates the possi-ble effects these different channels have on collaborative design in general and col-laborative design communication in particular. We argue that successful CMCD does not necessarily mean emulating close prox-imity environments. Excluding certain communication channels in a CMCD envi-ronment might affect the flow and quantity of synchronous collaborative communica-tion, but not necessarily the quality and content of mutually communicated and rep-resented design ideas. Therefore different communication channels might affect the type of communication and not necessarily the content of the communication. We propose that audio and video are not essential communication channels in CMCD environments. We posit that architects will collaborate and communicate design representations effectively although with some differences, since those two chan-nels might cause interruptions and successful collaborative sessions can take place without them. For this purpose we conducted twenty-four one-hour experiments involving final year architecture students all working to the same design brief. The experiments were divided into three categories, FTF, full computer mediated collaborative design sessions (CMCD-a; audio-video conferencing plus whiteboard as a shared drawing space) and limited computer mediated collaborative design sessions (CMCD-b; with Lambda MOO used as a chat medium plus whiteboard as a shared drawing space). The experiments were video and audio taped, transcribed and coded into a custom developed coding scheme. The results of the analysed coded data and observations of the videotapes provided evidence that there were noticeable differences between the three categories. There was more design communication and less communication control in the CMCD-b category compared to the FTF and CMCD-a categories. Verbal communi-cation became shorter and straight to the point in CMCD-b as opposed to spontane-ous non-stop chat in the other two categories. Moreover in CMCD-b the subjects were observed to be more reflective as well as choosing and re-examining their words to explain ideas to their partners. At times they were seen scrolling back through the text of the conversation in order to re-analyse or interpret the design ideas at hand. This was impossible in FTF and CMCD-a sessions, since the sub-jects were more spontaneous and audio representations were lost as soon as they were uttered. Also the video channel in the CMCD-a category was ignored and hardly used except for the first few minutes of the experiments, for a brief exchange of light humour on the appearance of each subject. The results obtained from analysing the experiments helped us conclude that differ-ent communication channels produce different collaborative environments. The three categories of communication for architectural collaboration explored in our ex-periments are indicative of the alternatives available to architects now. What is not clear to architects is why they would choose one category over another. We pro-pose that each category has its own strengths and difficulties for architectural col-laboration, and therefore should be selected on the basis of the type of communica-tion considered to be most effective for the stage and tasks of the design project

Virtual Reality Games for Motor Rehabilitation

This paper presents a fuzzy logic based method to track user satisfaction without the need for devices to monitor users physiological conditions. User satisfaction is the key to any product’s acceptance; computer applications and video games provide a unique opportunity to provide a tailored environment for each user to better suit their needs. We have implemented a non-adaptive fuzzy logic model of emotion, based on the emotional component of the Fuzzy Logic Adaptive Model of Emotion (FLAME) proposed by El-Nasr, to estimate player emotion in UnrealTournament 2004. In this paper we describe the implementation of this system and present the results of one of several play tests. Our research contradicts the current literature that suggests physiological measurements are needed. We show that it is possible to use a software only method to estimate user emotion

Designing technology for young children: guidelines grounded in a literature investigation on child development and children's technology

This thesis is about the design of technology for children from five to eight years of age. The majority of available guidelines and principles for design or evaluation of technology support the design of products aimed at adults. The limited guidelines available for design of young children's technology do not focus sufficiently on age-related requirements or they offer high-level advice that is only useful in the planning stages of design. Working from the assumption that knowledge available in the literature provides sufficient information to support this process, my aim with this study was to demonstrate how a dependable and useful set of guidelines for the design of technology for children aged five to eight years could be derived from an existing body of knowledge. Development of the guidelines firstly involved research into the psychological theories of children's development to identify those elements of development and the characteristics of children that may have bearing on children's use of technology. Secondly, the literature on children's development of specific skills such as literacy and mathematics was investigated. The available literature on young children's use of technology was studied next and, finally, the applicability of existing design guidelines and principles for children's products evaluated. Throughout this literature investigation the researcher gathered design-relevant factors that could potentially become design guidelines. Using qualitative data analysis techniques, more than five hundred such data elements were systematically coded, processed, analysed and categorised. The result is three hundred and fifty guidelines organised into a framework of six categories and twenty-six subcategories that integrates the relevant theoretical fields and provides practical support for designers. To demonstrate the credibility and usefulness of the emerging guidelines they were used to do an evaluation and re-design of an existing product aimed at the target group. The thesis reports in detail on the different stages of the research, and systematically takes the reader through the process of deriving guidelines from existing theory and research findings, and integrating them into a useful framework.School of ComputingPhD. (Computer Science

Washington University Record, September 16, 2005

https://digitalcommons.wustl.edu/record/2046/thumbnail.jp