Autistic children are increasingly a focus of technology research within the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) community. We provide a critical review of the purposes of these technologies and how they discursively conceptualise the agency of autistic children. Through our analysis, we establish six categories of these purposes: behaviour analysis, assistive technologies, education, social skills, therapy and well-being. Further, our discussion of these purposes shows how the technologies embody normative expectations of a neurotypical society, which predominantly views autism as a medical deficit in need of ‘correction’. Autistic children—purportedly the beneficiaries of these technologies—thus become a secondary audience to the largely externally defined purposes. We identify a lack of design for technologies that are geared towards the interests, needs and desires of autistic children. To move HCI’s research into autism beyond this, we provide guidance on how to consider agency in use and explicitly allow for appropriation beyond externally driven goals.

中文翻译：

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技术研究中的自闭症儿童机构——批判性文献综述

自闭症儿童越来越成为人机交互 (HCI) 社区中技术研究的焦点。我们对这些技术的目的以及它们如何将自闭症儿童的能动性概念化进行批判性审查。通过我们的分析，我们将这些目的分为六类：行为分析、辅助技术、教育、社交技能、治疗和幸福。此外，我们对这些目的的讨论表明，这些技术如何体现了神经典型社会的规范期望，该社会主要将自闭症视为需要“纠正”的医疗缺陷。自闭症儿童——据称是这些技术的受益者——因此成为主要外部定义目的的次要受众。我们发现缺乏针对利益的技术设计，自闭症儿童的需求和愿望。为了使 HCI 对自闭症的研究超出此范围，我们提供了有关如何考虑使用中的代理并明确允许超出外部驱动目标的拨款的指导。