Adaptive Soft Switches: Co-Designing Fabric Adaptive Switches with Occupational Therapists for Children and Adolescents with Acquired Brain Injury

Acquired brain injuries have many complexities, largely affecting motor and cognitive functioning. Occupational therapists often use switches attached to electronics that activate the devices to give people with disabilities the ability to interact with toys and electronics. However, current switches on the market are expensive, break easily and are unable to customize. We ran two co-design workshops and follow-up interviews with 14 occupational therapists specializing in students with acquired brain injuries. In phase one, the occupation therapists built three soft switches and brainstormed iterations. In phase two, we gained valuable insights into the iterations from occupational therapists. This paper contributes to Human-Computer Interaction as a case study, designs guidelines to support co-design with occupational therapists, and discusses the potential of adaptive soft switches. This work contributes to the growing literature around supporting occupational therapists as makers and how researchers can support them during the co-design process.