A 3D Rhythm-based Serious Game for Collaboration Improvement of Children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

The ”ADDventurous Rhythmical Planet” is a multimodal 3D serious game that exploits the benefits of music and rhythm to help children diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) to confront important psychosocial challenges. Music is shown to significantly help children maintain focused attention as well as offer a timed structure around their actions, involving melody and tempo. The advantages of music are exploited in the game, using a tin drum. This drum is used by the player to produce rhythm and it is connected to the computer via a Makey Makey board. This board sends each drum knock as a mouse click signal to the computer. Using the drum, the player tries to reproduce a given beat, and subsequently synchronize with another player, so that they cooperatively produce an expected beat. This creates a connection between the real and the virtual world of the game. In order for the hero of the game to progress in the game, the player uses the tin drum to reproduce a number of rhythms. After completing the single-user mode, the player moves on to the multi-user mode. In this mode, the two players have to hold hands and use the tin drum to collaboratively reproduce the requested beat. For the input management and comparison of rhythms, a special algorithm was implemented. The algorithm takes the beat created by the player and compares it to the expected beat. The player completes the game level if the rhythm played is similar enough to the rhythm heard. If not, the player tries again to reproduce the expected rhythm. The player receives a visual representation of the beat played, showing the correct knocks and the wrong ones. The pilot evaluation presented confirms the effectiveness of the game and demonstrates the benefits of rhythm in order to enhance social skills and collaboration between children.