Erin Robinson

University of York

Erin is an experienced artist, interactive installation designer and music educator specialising in open-ended play in early years’ foundation settings. Her PhD will focus on researching design patterns to support open-ended play experiences in adulthood with interactive installations, with the goal of supporting well-being, creativity, physicality and social interaction among players. She will be combining theory from different interrelated fields including play design, HCI, sandbox video-games and artistic applications of AI to guide creative practice research. In particular, she is interested in casual creators and looks to build on her previous experience of designing interactive installations to support exploratory art and music creation.

Erin’s work in open-ended play design for early years has motivated her to understand and research how similar provisions can be designed for adulthood. This research will provide a framework for designing for open- ended play in interactive installations in adulthood which doesn’t exist as of yet, and will provide valuable insight into interactivity design for open-ended play in video games, both for traditional in home gaming, and games in alternative settings. Additionally, Erin hopes that this research will aid digital installation creators in designing playful works for public, education or exhibition purposes, while also providing inspiration for designing open- ended play experiences for the purpose of well-being and mental health, both inside and outside of medical institution.