Wildcard
Wearable Immersive Virtual Reality for Children with Neurodevelopmental Disorder
Wearable Immersive Virtual Reality for Children with Neurodevelopmental Disorder
Wildcard taget users are children with Neurodevelopmental Disorder (Autism, Intellectual Disability, ADHD Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder)
Wildcard goal is to promote concentration and attention capabilities in an engaging and enternaining way. Attention is a pre-requisite for learning processes and social autonomy.
Wildcard offers a set of immersive virtual reality experiences leveraging a low-cost VR viewer and common smartphones. Moreover Wildcard provides a platform to create gaming activities aiming at supporting existing therapies for children with Neurodevelopmental Disorders.
Each activity is characterized by its graphical aspect which defines the game theme and the experience, These factors are parametric and can be set by therapists so the immersive virtual reality experience can be adapted to the child's specific needs.
Google Cardboard is the viewer in which to pop the smartphone to enjoy the immersion accorded by virtual reality.
The smartphone is the second essential component because it provides the screen on which the virtual world is represented.
Unity 3D is the cross-platform game engine used to develop the therapeutic games that can be downloaded on smartphones.
It is possible to decide themes, images and general actions characterizing the game thanks to a web platform compatible with main browsers.
Immersive virtual reality experiences are based on 3 books children are familiar with.
A sunny day, a curious little girl and a playful wave - artist Suzy Lee has taken these three simple elements and created a visual tour-de-force that needs absolutely no words to tell its universal story.
Giulio Coniglio is a character created by Nicoletta Costa about a rabbit which lives many adventures in fantastic worlds.
Pimpa is a famous characte that had its 40th bithday in 2015. It a reference book for children with plenty of educational adventures.
Study performed in collaboration with L'abilità Onlus.
In this step children play with cardboard visors they made as an exercise. In this way they will accept more easily the real viewer for the VR experience.
In the study children take part to one session per week and play the games they prefer.
In the validation children are asked about tehir experience as a feedback for therapists.
This project is promising because of its customization and the possibility to tailor each session for a single child.
The immersion component from virtual reality was a stimulating and pleasant experience for children: it helped improving assimilation and language skills.