Tom Tom: jogo educacional digital de suporte à teoria da mente para crianças no transtorno do espectro do autismo

Abstract

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) presents qualitative impairments as characteristics, related to interaction, social communication and behavioral patterns. The processes that enable social development and, therefore, the aspects mentioned, comprise social cognition, which has the function of mediating social relations. In turn, the area of social cognition with the greatest damage in TEA is called Theory of Mind (ToM), responsible for allowing the understanding and prediction of its own actions and the actions of third parties. It is through this metarepresentation that a person can understand desires, emotions, cognitions and beliefs, as well as allowing to negotiate, to cheat, to teach. People with ASD reveal flaws in ToM, when expressing difficulty in establishing and maintaining social relationships, which directly interferes in their learning process and, consequently, in engagement with school activities, in interaction with their peers and with teachers. Digital games, in turn, have shown effective results in the field of education, notably for children with qualitatively different development trajectories. For this reason, the present research has as main objective to develop a digital game (ToM ToM) for evaluation and intervention in the domain of ToM in children aged 6 (six) to 8 (eight) years with ASD. The methodology of elaboration and development of the ToM ToM game consisted of the following phases: pre-production (planning, elaboration of the Game Design Document, based on classic ToM paradigms), production (prototyping of the game) and post-production (technical validation, content and pedagogical). The methodological path adopted is characterized as quanti-qualitative, with elements of exploratory and explanatory research, given that information is raised about the object of study, to delimit the field of action and, then, record and analyze the data in order to seek explanations for what was observed. The data obtained in the post-production stage, from the analysis of judges, revealed that the game was considered adequate, being recommended as an instrument for expanding learning. The product derived from this study contributes to the offer of a tool that simultaneously enables assessment and intervention, corroborating the acquisition of skills and new skills in the field of ToM for students with autism.