Giving autistic children a voice through playful, sensory communication

Context

As part of my first year in the Master's program in Interactivity and UX Design at IIM Digital School, we were tasked with designing an innovative solution to improve the daily life of a person with a disability. Inspired by the significant challenges faced by children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and their caregivers, we chose to focus our project on creating an emotional communication tool for children aged 6 to 10.

‍

The Challenge

Children with autism often struggle to recognize, express, and communicate their emotions, which can increase their stress levels and affect their daily lives and social integration. This challenge also creates a heavy mental load for caregivers, who often lack clear tools to understand and support their children effectively. Existing solutions are often too generic or fragmented, making it difficult to meet the diverse needs of autistic children and their families.

User Research & Insights

To better understand these challenges, we conducted interviews with:

✅ Parents of autistic children, sharing their daily struggles and needs.
✅ The president of an association and former school assistant for children with disabilities, providing a school environment perspective.
✅ A nurse from an Autism Resource Center, explaining current challenges and approaches in the field.

Key Insights:

• Communication difficulties: Children struggle to express or verbalize emotions, leading to stress and crises.
• Caregiver mental load: Parents juggle professional life with the intense needs of their children without adequate tools.
• Lack of suitable solutions: Current solutions do not fully address the diverse needs of autistic children.
• Sensory importance: Children respond strongly to sensory stimuli, which can soothe or stress them depending on how they are designed.

These insights highlighted the need for a sensory, reassuring, and accessible communication tool focused on emotional expression.

Ideation

Based on our research, we explored solutions that could:

• Help children express emotions simply and playfully.
• Offer sensory comfort (soft textures, soothing lights).
• Provide clear, centralized emotional data to caregivers.
• Be used independently by children aged 6–10 with minimal adult intervention.

We brainstormed various forms and interactions before landing on the octopus shape, with each tentacle representing a different emotion, offering both emotional expression and a comforting, sensory experience.

‍

Solution : Our first prototype

We developed PILOE, a connected emotional tool with two key components:

A sensory octopus toy:

• Soft fabric tentacles, each representing an emotion.
• Integrated sensors inside the tentacles to detect interactions.
• LED eyes that change expressions according to the selected emotion, providing immediate visual feedback.
• A translucent 3D-printed head to diffuse calming lights.
• A comforting, playful design that encourages children to interact.

‍

Iteration

After the first round of prototype testing, we identified key areas for improvement:

• Ergonomics: We needed to reduce the internal wiring to avoid false contacts and improve the toy’s usability.
• Aesthetics: The design needed to be more attractive and stable for children to use safely and comfortably.
• Advanced Features: We aimed to synchronize the LED eyes with the tentacles to strengthen the visual feedback and emotional connection.

Based on these insights, we developed a second version of the prototype:

• A reinforced structure with a wider, more stable head.
• Tentacles with improved stitching for a cleaner, professional finish.
• Optimized wiring with a dedicated motherboard to ensure reliability.
• Enhanced LED eye expressions and updated icons on the tentacles for clearer emotion representation.

These iterations helped us refine PILOE into a more user-friendly, engaging, and emotionally supportive tool for children with autism and their caregivers.

Results & Next Steps

Through these iterations, PILOE evolved into a comforting and intuitive communication tool, helping children express their emotions more easily while providing parents with clearer insights into their child’s emotional world.

Building on this success, we focused on developing the connected app for caregivers.

This app would sync with the PILOE toy to : ‍

• ‍Collect and centralize emotional data, allowing parents to track emotional trends,
• Document daily notes, and gain a better understanding of their child's needs over time.

By combining the physical comfort of the toy with the analytical support of the app, PILOE creates a holistic solution that strengthens the emotional connection between children with autism and their caregivers.