‘Emotiplay’: a serious game for learning about emotions in children with autism: results of a cross-cultural evaluation

S. Fridenson-Hayo; S. Berggren; A. Lassalle; S. Tal; D. Pigat; N. Meir-Goren; H. O’Reilly; S. Ben-Zur; S. Bölte; S. Baron-Cohen; O. Golan

doi:10.1007/s00787-017-0968-0

‘Emotiplay’: a serious game for learning about emotions in children with autism: results of a cross-cultural evaluation

S. Fridenson-Hayo, S. Berggren, A. Lassalle, S. Tal, D. Pigat, N. Meir-Goren, H. O’Reilly, S. Ben-Zur, S. Bölte, S. Baron-Cohen, O. Golan

Department of Psychology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

101 Scopus citations

Abstract

Children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC) experience difficulties recognizing others’ emotions and mental states. It has been shown that serious games (SG) can produce simplified versions of the socio-emotional world. The current study performed a cross-cultural evaluation (in the UK, Israel and Sweden) of Emotiplay’s SG, a system aimed to teach emotion recognition (ER) to children with ASC in an entertaining, and intrinsically motivating way. Participants were 6–9 year olds with high functioning ASC who used the SG for 8–12 weeks. Measures included face, voice, body, and integrative ER tasks, as well as parent-reported level of autism symptoms, and adaptive socialization. In the UK, 15 children were tested before and after using the SG. In Israel (n = 38) and Sweden (n = 36), children were randomized into a SG or a waiting list control group. In the UK, results revealed that 8 weeks of SG use significantly improved participants’ performance on ER body language and integrative tasks. Parents also reported their children improved their adaptive socialization. In Israel and Sweden, participants using the SG improved significantly more than controls on all ER measures. In addition, parents in the Israeli SG group reported their children showed reduced autism symptoms after using the SG. In conclusion, Emotiplay’s SG is an effective and motivating psycho-educational intervention, cross-culturally teaching ER from faces, voices, body language, and their integration in context to children with high functioning ASC. Local evidence was found for more generalized gains to socialization and reduced autism symptoms.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	979-992
Number of pages	14
Journal	European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Volume	26
Issue number	8
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-017-0968-0
State	Published - 1 Aug 2017

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2017, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.

Funding

We would like to acknowledge the contribution of our research teams at all sites. In the UK: Kirsty Macmillan, Nisha Hickin, Mathilde Matthews, and Kate Lindley Baron-Cohen. In Sweden: Sigrid Elfström, Nina Milenkovic, and Anna Råde. In Israel: Michal Landa, Tal Katan, Galit Govezensky, Keren Hadad, and Reut Meidler. Finally, we would like to thank the study’s participants and their families. This study was conducted as part of the ASC-Inclusion Project and has received funding from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) under grant Agreement No [289021]. The Swedish authors were also supported by the Swedish Research Council. The UK authors were also supported by the Autism Research Trust, by the MRC, and by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care East of England at Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health.

Funders	Funder number
Autism Research Trust
Seventh Framework Programme	289021
Medical Research Council	G0600977
National Institute for Health Research
Vetenskapsrådet

Keywords

Autism spectrum condition
Cross-cultural study
Emotion recognition
Intervention evaluation
Serious games

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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10.1007/s00787-017-0968-0

Cite this

Fridenson-Hayo, S., Berggren, S., Lassalle, A., Tal, S., Pigat, D., Meir-Goren, N., O’Reilly, H., Ben-Zur, S., Bölte, S., Baron-Cohen, S., & Golan, O. (2017). ‘Emotiplay’: a serious game for learning about emotions in children with autism: results of a cross-cultural evaluation. European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 26(8), 979-992. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-017-0968-0

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abstract = "Children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC) experience difficulties recognizing others{\textquoteright} emotions and mental states. It has been shown that serious games (SG) can produce simplified versions of the socio-emotional world. The current study performed a cross-cultural evaluation (in the UK, Israel and Sweden) of Emotiplay{\textquoteright}s SG, a system aimed to teach emotion recognition (ER) to children with ASC in an entertaining, and intrinsically motivating way. Participants were 6–9 year olds with high functioning ASC who used the SG for 8–12 weeks. Measures included face, voice, body, and integrative ER tasks, as well as parent-reported level of autism symptoms, and adaptive socialization. In the UK, 15 children were tested before and after using the SG. In Israel (n = 38) and Sweden (n = 36), children were randomized into a SG or a waiting list control group. In the UK, results revealed that 8 weeks of SG use significantly improved participants{\textquoteright} performance on ER body language and integrative tasks. Parents also reported their children improved their adaptive socialization. In Israel and Sweden, participants using the SG improved significantly more than controls on all ER measures. In addition, parents in the Israeli SG group reported their children showed reduced autism symptoms after using the SG. In conclusion, Emotiplay{\textquoteright}s SG is an effective and motivating psycho-educational intervention, cross-culturally teaching ER from faces, voices, body language, and their integration in context to children with high functioning ASC. Local evidence was found for more generalized gains to socialization and reduced autism symptoms.",

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Fridenson-Hayo, S, Berggren, S, Lassalle, A, Tal, S, Pigat, D, Meir-Goren, N, O’Reilly, H, Ben-Zur, S, Bölte, S, Baron-Cohen, S & Golan, O 2017, '‘Emotiplay’: a serious game for learning about emotions in children with autism: results of a cross-cultural evaluation', European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, vol. 26, no. 8, pp. 979-992. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-017-0968-0

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‘Emotiplay’: a serious game for learning about emotions in children with autism: results of a cross-cultural evaluation

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Funding

Keywords

UN SDGs

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