Here is a link to my zipped file describing my user testing plans.

User Testing Materials

It has been extremely difficult to find people with ASD to user test my ideas. For now, I have gone through testing with 2 people with ASD- Jesse Saperstein and Paloma Kalisch, 1 occupational therapist who specializes in ASD- Kristie Keonig, and 1 parent and education specialist for ASD- Beth Rosenberg. By next week, I should have feedback by one more person with ASD- Jack Rosenberg, and an art therapist.

Though I have had few interviews, I have received some very insightful feedback:

Kristie: The framework dealing with solid and flexible is in line with Kristie’s experiences and perspective as an occupational therapist. Both ideas seem interesting and potentially appealing to people with ASD. The wearable idea is somewhat similar to an elastic suit, but the elastic suit feels restrictive and looks like a medieval torture device. The game idea is promising, but the flashing colors in the background could cause seizures. The use of visual representations of movement on the screen could be very helpful and appealing to people with ASD, who tend to be visually very strong. The current visuals looks like a light saber.

Beth: The framework is elegant and insightful. The abstract is well-written with strong content. The wearable idea is potentially groundbreaking, but would be a huge project. This may not be a feasible amount of work for one person in one semester of graduate school (she is right). While the wearable mover could revolutionize therapy for ASD, it will probably not appeal to people on the spectrum as much as the other idea. The game idea is promising for the population and an exciting possibility for Tech Kids Unlimited. Beth’s students and son would probably be very excited to play a game like this, and it could provide a helpful reset button for school and work settings. The colors of the visuals at this point are great. The scoring seems to be working well, too.

Paloma: Paloma does not have problems with repetitive or jerky movements. She does not use stimming. However, Paloma become excited about the possibility of the wearable device. She would want to try it if I could make it. She hesitantly said that she preferred the wearable idea to the game idea. Paloma played both of the current games a few times. She found that the smooth movement game was too hard and gave up quickly. I may need to tweak the numbers so that winning is not an insurmountable goal for people with ASD. Paloma enjoyed the rough movements game. She wanted a flexible controller made of natural materials and abstract visuals.

Jesse: Jesse felt that the wearable idea was promising for children with ASD. He thought that it was a radical new idea that could change occupational therapy. He also thought there was potential for it to interrupt negative thought patterns with physical movements. He felt that the idea would be better if there was some kind of fantasy/narrative element added to the creation of goals for the device. Jesse preferred the game idea to the wearable idea. He felt that the controllers should be flexible, and suggested that they have water/fluid inside them like a squeezy ball. When I said that the movements were intended to be free so that users could express themselves however they wanted, Jesse seemed to like the idea more. Jesse thought this would be better if connected to a character like Spongebob. He also thought it could be a potential way for unemployed adults with ASD to stay occupied rather than falling into depression.

Takeaways:

It is clear that none of these four people understood the idea of the wearable device as an art piece commenting on assistive tech and ability. They all saw it as a therapeutic device. It may be possible to create a wearable device that serves the purpose of art in the amount of time that I have, but to create something intended for therapy would require more functionality to be effective. This does seem insurmountable. The game idea seems more realistic. The handheld controller still seems like a sensory Wii. Since Wii exists and had a lot more time, money, and expert game-makers behind it than my project will have, it seems silly to reinvent the wheel. It also seems that the game that Jesse has in mind is similar to a lot of games that already exist with characters and a narrative. This is all an enormous amount of work to create and may end up being just the same as everything else. I am going to keep going with the abstract movement visualization ideas and I’ll see what kind of games I can come up with. For now, I am going to prototype a game with a physical controller, which happens to be wearable.

Here is a link to my zipped file describing my user testing results so far.

User Testing Results