Designing for Engagement in Augmented Reality Games to Assess Upper Extremity Motor Dysfunctions

Currently, each medical discipline involved in assessing motor disorders in various patient groups is using subjectively scored clinical tests, qualitative video analysis, or cumbersome marker-based motion capturing. This extended abstract investigates the potential of a serious game implemented as an Augmented Reality (AR) application to facilitate objective, quantitative and valid measures of the factors contributing to upper extremity motor dysfunction. First, the design process of the game and the system architecture of the AR framework are described. Second, a study about game engagement is presented based on an experiment we conducted with eight healthy people, aged between 52-79. The results of the study show that there is potential for engagement, but the usability needs to be improved before it can emerge.