In this article we argue for an interdisciplinary approach to designing interactive technology for young children on the Autistic Spectrum. We believe it key for the design process to embrace perspectives from diverse fields to arrive at a methodology, and consequently technology, that delivers satisfactory outcomes for all stakeholders involved. The ECHOES project has provided us with the opportunity to work on a technology-enhanced learning environment that supports acquisition and exploration of social skills by typically developing children and children with high-functioning autism and Asperger Syndrome. ECHOES' research methodology and the learning environment relies crucially on multi-disciplinary expertise including developmental and clinical psychology, visual arts, human-computer interaction, artificial intelligence, education and many other cognate disciplines. In this article, we reflect on the methods needed to develop a technology-enhanced learning environment for young users with Autism Spectrum Disorder. We identify key benefits, challenges and limitations of this approach. Although the context of ECHOES is very specific, we believe that there are a number of guidelines for the desing of technology-enhanced intervention for autism that can benefit a wider community of researchers in this emerging discipline.

This article examines the educational efficacy of a learning environment in which children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC) engage in social interactions with an artificially intelligent (AI) virtual agent and where a human practitioner acts in support of the interactions. A multi-site intervention study in schools across the UK was conducted with 29 children with ASC and learning difficulties, aged 4-14 years old. For reasons related to data completeness and amount of exposure to the AI environment, data for 15 children was included in the analysis. The analysis revealed a significant increase in the proportion of social responses made by ASC children to human practitioners. The number of initiations made to human practitioners and to the virtual agent by the ASC children also increased numerically over the course of the sessions. However, due to large individual differences within the ASC group, this did not reach significance. Although no evidence of transfer to the real-world post-test was shown, anecdotal evidence of classroom transfer was reported. The work presented in this article offers an important contribution to the growing body of research in the context of AI technology design and use for autism intervention in real school contexts. Specifically, the work highlights key methodological challenges and opportunities in this area by leveraging interdisciplinary insights in a way that (i) bridges between educational interventions and intelligent technology design practices, (ii) considers the design of technology as well as the design of its use (context and procedures) on par with one another, and (iii) includes design contributions from different stakeholders, including children with and without ASC diagnosis, educational practitioners, and researchers.

Facebook is one of the largest social networking sites, with over 1.23 billion users. Many students use Facebook as a platform to enhance their learning experience. A growing body of literature reports on the motivation of students and staff to engage with Facebook as a learning platform as well as mapping such activities to pedagogy and curricula. This paper outlines a Facebook strategy that has been embraced by the student body. Focus groups investigated the use of Facebook, which closely maps to the curriculum. Results show that the Facebook strategy is useful in promoting collaborative learning alongside the face-to-face delivery of content. Participants rebuked the perceived blurring of educational and social purposes, which is prevalent in the literature, with the current structure allowing a clear divide between their different uses of Facebook. The development of further guidelines for the use of Facebook for education is encouraged and recommendations are provided.

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Background: Patients with intellectual disabilities have poorer oral hygiene than the general population. These oral health problems may stem from the anxiety that these patients experience on visiting the dentist. Dental staff may also have difficulty in ensuring their patients understand the treatments they receive at the dentist. Making dentists aware of their communication strategy may combat some of the barriers that some patients with complex communication needs experience in the dental setting. The aim of this study was to report a newly applied training technique to the dental setting to examine dentist/patient communication.Materials and Methods: A dentist participated in Video Interaction Guidance to encourage more attuned interactions with their patients. The dentist was presented with short segments of video footage taken during an appointment with two patients with intellectual disabilities and communication difficulties. Having observed their interactions, the dentist was asked to reflect on their communication strategies with the assistance of a trained VIG specialist.Results: The dentist successfully identified several verbal and non-verbal communication strategies they believed to be effective in reducing patient anxiety and relinquishing control to the patient.Where these strategies were omitted not used, the dentist recognised their strategy and gave positive reflections that may improve future interactions with their patients.Discussion: The VIG session was beneficial in this exploratory investigation because the dentist could identify when their interactions were most effective. Awareness of their non-verbal and verbal communication strategies and the need to adopt these behaviours frequently, were identified as key to improving outcomes for their patients. 3 IntroductionPatient compliance in health interventions can be encouraged if the clinician can communicate effectively with their patients (Freeman & Humphries, 2006). This can provide life-long benefits for patients, leading to increased health and wellbeing. Where communication falters, patients may have greater difficulty accepting their treatments and become disengaged from the decision making process (Hacking, Scott, Wallace, Shepherd & Belkora, 2013). This can lead patients to feel more uncertain and anxious about the outcome of their treatments, particularly with complex clinical procedures where communication may be more challenging. Dougall and Fiske (2008) suggest that the verbal and non-verbal cues that are used during communication do not occur equally. For example, 'words' are thought to take up 7% of our communication with others, whilst a persons' tone of voice and non-verbal cues (i.e. facial expressions and body language) contribute 33% and 60%, respectively. To ensure that a message has been understood, the communicator should ask the individual receiving the message whether they understand what is being communicated and reflect on their communication strategy. Where verbal and non-verbal signals are incongruent...