Hows

For young people with an autism spectrum disorder it is hard to keep an overview of daily tasks and chores and that makes it difficult for them to maintain a household. Dr. Leo Kannerhuis – a specialized mental healthcare organization for people with autism – helps these young people with their daily chores by way of self-reliance training. However, tasks like doing laundry, doing the dishes and cleaning are no fun and it is difficult to motivate participants in the training to fulfill these tasks on a regular basis. Therefore, Dr. Leo Kannerhuis contacted Ranj to develop a game that motivates players to do household chores and to organize their lives. The result is Hows.

Structure
Hows is an online game in which the mentor gives the player tasks that he has to fulfill in real life. Everything the player needs to do is included in an online task list that can also be accessed on a mobile device, such as a smartphone. This list gives the player structure and clearness and a good overview of all the chores he still needs to do and the steps he needs to take to do complete these tasks. The player receives help from a virtual coach that gives access to personalized tools such as reminders, manuals en instruction videos. Furthermore, the coach keeps track of the progress of the tasks and provides feedback when tasks have been completed or when the player does not fulfill his tasks within set deadlines.

 Rewards
The player gains reward points by completing tasks. These points can be used for rewards in the online game world or in the real world and help to keep the player motivated. He can use the reward points to buy furniture and accessories for his personalized digital dream house. The more points the player accumulates, the better the available rewards get. The player can also choose to use his points to get real world rewards, such as dispensation for certain chores during the training, movie tickets or a day at the Efteling (a famous Dutch theme park).

Gamification
In Hows Ranj integrates game principles in the daily life of the youngsters with autism spectrum disorder to increase their involvement and to help them solve the problems they have maintaining a household. This makes Hows a perfect example of gamification.

During the development of Hows Ranj made sure that the game is fully integrated in the other applications that Dr. Leo Kannerhuis offers. The latter has already indicated that they would like to expand the game with additional possibilities for mobile devices.