The DCD Project
Researching and raising awareness of DCD
What do we do?
Dyspraxia, or as it is called in the research literature ‘developmental coordination disorder’ (DCD), is a condition affecting a broad range of movements in otherwise typically-developing children. These children, of course, grow up to be adults, who continue to find many dailly activities challenging. The DCD project is a collection of ongoing research projects in the Department of Public Health and Sports Science at the University of Exeter using immersive virtual reality (VR) to try and better understand dyspraxia and improve the ecosystem around this condition.
Mohammed Alharbi is a pediatric physiotherapist undertaking a PhD examining whether VR can improve movement skills and enjoyment of sports in dyspraxic children.
Jack Evans, a PhD student funded by EPSRC, is using VR and mathematical modelling to examine and compare precise features of hand and arm movements in dyspraxic adults and stroke survivors to try and identify personalized rehabilitation.
Finally, Haoyang Du is a research assistant with a backgroud in computer science who is working on a project funded by The Waterloo Foundation to develop a fun and engaging VR screening tool for dyspraxic adolescents, to speed up the diagnostic pathways in educational settings.
If you (or your children) are dyspraxic and interested in taking part in any of these research projects, please get in touch with Dr Gavin Buckingham, who oversees these research projects (g.buckingham@exeter.ac.uk).
We're currently looking for adolescents who have lived experience of DCD to help us design our research related to virtual reality and sports. We want to listen to the community to get your perspective on what we should be focusing on.
If you are interested in contributing in this way, please get in touch!