Children who have experienced abuse or neglect carry brain changes that make them far more likely to develop depression, anxiety, or personality disorders later in life—and a new project aims to build playful digital tools that could help them before illness takes hold. The problem is stark: childhood trauma is the single strongest predictor of lifelong mental ill-health, yet psychological therapy remains difficult to scale. These children’s brains process threat and reward abnormally, leaving them vulnerable to conditions such as borderline personality disorder, ADHD, and autism. Current services cannot meet demand, and digital interventions that support the therapeutic relationship are largely absent. The PACT project will co-design wearable and playful technologies that help young people recognise their own body signals—such as rising anger—and practise repairing small breakdowns in communication, known as “rupture and repair.” Mastering these skills is essential for healthy relationships, yet profoundly difficult for trauma-affected children. If successful, the research could reduce the strain on NHS and social services by giving clinicians scalable tools that work alongside therapy. It would not replace human care, but extend it—helping children who have had the most difficult of starts build emotional resilience and avoid later-life mental and physical illness.
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This grant's vision is to develop the novel technologies that reduce the incidence and severity of mental ill-health in young people who have experienced complex trauma. Childhood trauma such as sexual, physical or mental abuse and neglect represents the most potent predictor of poor mental health across the life span. The world appears This can be explained in part by changes in their neurological processing. The abuse fundamentally changed the way the brain functions in areas that process threat and reward responses, as well as the executive function ability. The changes at a brain level may not yet express as mental illness, but they are similar in nature to the brain functioning of people with severe mental illness. They can are waiting to be activated into ill health, and as the world is confusing and threatening to these children, there are increases stressors present to activate the ill-health pathways. Children who experienced trauma are therefore much more at risk of later life diagnosis of a range of mental health conditions (e.g.depression, anxiety, borderline personality disorder ADHD and Autism). Current treatment for overcoming trauma is psychological therapy, where children, often through play, get to explore situations at distance from reality. Play is central for child development, it allows children to experience emotions and behaviours and role play coping strategies. However, current healthcare services are struggling to scale therapeutic care. Furthermore, digital interventions could support the therapeutic relationship. For example wearable technology could help a young person learn about their body responses which happen just before an episode of anger, it could also help in simulating rupture and repair - moments where things break down but needed to be mended. Expressing emotion and repairing ruptures - small breakdowns in play or communication are incredibly difficult for children who have experienced trauma, and their inability to master these essential life skills is linked to later life physical and mental illness. Therefore, by co-designing playful technologies which support emotional expression and help build capacity to repair and build relationships we aim to increase the quality of life of these children who have had the most difficult of starts whilst simultaneously reducing the strain on NHS and social services.
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