Collaborative puzzle game: a tabletop interface for fostering collaborative skills in children with autism spectrum disorders

Tabletop interfaces are a novel class of technologies that are particularly suited to support co-located collaboration. The Collaborative Puzzle Game (CPG) is a tabletop interactive activity developed for fostering collaboration skills in children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). The CPG features an interaction rule called Enforced Collaboration (EC); in order to be moved, puzzle pieces must be touched and dragged simultaneously by the two players. Two studies were conducted to test the effect of EC on collaboration. In Study I, 70 typically developing boys were tested in pairs to characterise the way they respond to EC; in Study II, 16 boys with ASD were tested in pairs. Results suggest that EC has a generally positive effect on collaboration and is associated with more complex interactions. For children with ASD, the EC interaction rule was effective in triggering behaviours associated with co-ordination of the task and negotiation.