Hap Scotch

Children and adults with autism, as well as those with other developmental disabilities, may have a dysfunctional sensory system. Sometimes one or more senses are either over or under-reactive to stimulation. HapScotch is a haptic hopscotch mat for children with tactile sensitivity disorder. Tactile sensitivity disorder can be reduced using therapy. Children are given stimulation through various textures depending on the kind of tactile disorder they have.

Guide

Vikram Singh Parmar

The Problem

There are two kinds of tactile sensitivity disorder - hyper and hypo. Hypersensitivity is extreme sensitivity to touch. Hyposensitivity is less than normal sensitivity to touch.

Traits of children with Hypersensitivity

Traits of children with Hyposensitivity

Tactile disorder is often seen in children in the autism spectrum. Children in the autism spectrum have a shorter attention span as compared to most children. As a result the loose interest very quickly. In order to keep their attention something new is required every time they are playing with something.

Ideation

From our inspirations, we managed to create a concept drawing that stayed true to our vision. Initially, we were looking to have the amount of people as the input of the installation. However, after multiple rounds of ideation, we decided that it’ll be best to have our input as a single individual’s hand gesture.

Initial Prototype and Mock-ups

Building Final Prototype

Final Prototype

User Testing

Features

The Music

The music produced has a correlation with the shapes. For example, the music for the triangle contains 3 notes. As the number of sides increases so does the number of notes. The music played when you step on every shape, in any order, will always sound good.