Co-Designing an Ice-Breaker Game to Improve Socialization Experiences for Users with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Socialization is a key component of well-being. Despite technology that is meant to bring people together, no matter where they are in the world, people have never felt more alone and cut off from their communities. An ice-breaker game that utilizes computer vision to detect gestures could help alleviate some of the feelings of loneliness that people feel by allowing users to engage in-person with simple gestures and low-stakes. One specific group of people that this could help are people with Autism Spectrum Disorder, or ASD. Some people diagnosed with ASD might struggle to communicate and socialize with those around them. However, when it comes to designing software for people with ASD studies show that there are particular design aspects that must be considered in order for people with ASD to stay engaged and benefit the most from the software, such as engaging multiple senses and reducing frustration by allowing the user to go at a pace they deem comfortable. In order to determine how to make an ice-breaker game interface that users with ASD can get the most out of, a co-design workshop was designed to determine how the interface should be iterated upon to better support this target demographic. There is an emphasis on co-design with this project since only the target demographic of people with ASD know what changes would be best.