En läkande lek : Digitala spel som stöd till ett barn i sorg

Sammanfattning: Games are a natural part of many people's everyday lives and have gone from being a divergent interest to become Sweden's biggest cultural export. As a result from this expansion, digital tools had to be further developed and through this progress these tools have reached new areas of usage, which has created new challenges for game developers. The games that offers a higher purpose than pure entertainment goes under the genre serious games. Serious games are used in various application areas such as; in the military, health care, education, business, and psychology, which is the framework of this thesis. By combining and unifying previous research grounded in psychology and game science I want to answer the questions: How can games be used as a therapeutic tool in a child's grieving process? and, Which features should such a game focus on? These questions are answered through the information gathered from two interviews conducted with respondents that have different expertise within the area of this study, this to reach a broader perspective. A child's grieving process can manifest itself in various ways depending on the individual's level of sensitivity. It is therefore difficult to draw any general conclusions on how such a game should be designed. All games have the opportunity to motivate and engage, but this is not unique to a serious game and therefore a measurement function is essential in a digital rehabilitation tool to provide the therapist with valuable information about the patient. The figurative language makes it possible for the child to communicate where the spoken language sometimes has limits. For older children social support can be important as it creates opportunities to meet others in similar situations and together work towards improvement. Grief is a non-linear process and can present itself in many different ways and it is therefore important that the game should offer various turn-outs to make it adaptable for the individual.