CosyMind Cats: Immersive Wellbeing Game for Neurodivergent Children
One in seven UK children – 15-20% globally – are neurodivergent, facing daily anxiety and sensory overload with limited accessible support. Rising school absence and overstretched services mean families and educators urgently need new approaches to emotional wellbeing. We address this need with an inclusive, play-based experience for school and home.
CosyMind Cats is an immersive wellbeing game where children explore a safe, customisable world guided by a gentle, responsive cat companion. Through baking mini-games, guided breathing, sandbox drawing, and a digital sensory room, they practise emotion regulation at their own pace.
Our child-led co-design uses participatory methods so neurodivergent children and young adults shape authentic, respectful content.
CosyMind Cats pioneers adaptive immersive wellbeing across PC, VR, light-field displays, and immersive rooms. Biofeedback enables real-time adaptation to each child’s emotional state, while evaluation combines physiological and user measures to understand how immersive formats affect wellbeing.
We aim to establish CosyMind Cats as a scalable model for evidence-informed therapeutic games that expand equitable access to emotional support for neurodivergent children worldwide.
Project Impact
CosyMind Cats advances UN SDG 3 (Good Health and Wellbeing), SDG 4 (Quality Education), and SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities) by addressing anxiety-related barriers that limit participation and learning for neurodivergent children. Difficulties with emotional regulation contribute to absence, distress, and reduced engagement, while accessible support remains scarce. The project delivers scalable, evidence-informed intervention through interactive media deployed in school and home contexts.
Impact is measurable and actionable: pilots with children and young people via schools to evaluate changes in anxiety, regulation, and engagement using biofeedback, behavioural observation, and user-reported wellbeing. Targets include broad user reach, school adoption, and educator guidance for therapeutic immersive use. Findings inform iterative refinement and wider dissemination.
The project builds on established neurodiversity and immersive-intervention research. Co-investigator Dr Elisa Back has previously advised the House of Lords on neurodiversity and co-authored British Psychological Society guidelines for autism support, ensuring alignment with current evidence and practice. CosyMind Cats is designed to scale globally as a free wellbeing resource.
Inclusive Project
Our cross-disciplinary team spans Games Development, Psychology, Immersive Systems, and UX Research, combining technical expertise with lived and professional understanding of neurodiversity. Team members include inclusion advocates, accessibility-focused developers, and researchers working closely with neurodivergent children and families, grounding our approach in community needs rather than assumptions.
Neurodivergent children and young people are not only our audience but our co-designers. Using participatory methods, we involve them alongside families, educators, and SEN professionals through an advisory group and iterative testing. Early prototype testing with neurodivergent individuals has already shaped our sensory room features and cat companion behaviour. This ensures CosyMind Cats feels respectful, relevant, and empowering, created with the community, not for them. We partner with mainstream, autism-specialised, and SEN schools so it is valued by neurodivergent communities.
CosyMind Cats is designed for equitable access: free, literacy-light, sensory-customisable, and usable in school and home contexts. The project celebrates neurodivergent strengths and agency, creating a supportive space where difference is valued.