Stories of Healing: Integrating Narrative Therapy with Interactive Technology for Childhood Trauma Recovery 

Abstract

This thesis is driven by my desire to share and process my childhood traumas, while examining the sociocultural context of childhood trauma in East Asia. The investigation follows two main research directions. First, it explores how interactive media—such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and video games—can represent traumatic experiences in ways that evoke emotional resonance in audiences and foster self-awareness and critical reflection. Second, it investigates how techniques from narrative therapy can be embedded within interactive narrative artworks. Methodologically, this arts-based research integrates autoethnography to ground the inquiry in personal narrative, qualitative analysis of trauma narratives, narrative therapy, and interactive narrative design, as well as practice-based research for the creation of interactive artworks. The first theoretical contribution of this thesis is the development of ten design patterns for integrating narrative therapy into interactive narratives. These patterns can guide designers and artists in creating artworks with therapeutic potential and offer fresh inspiration for psychologists developing interactive applications for clinical therapy. The second theoretical contribution is the articulation of XR design techniques that can simultaneously trigger emotional arousal and encourage reflective thinking. In terms of practical contributions, this thesis produced two extended reality art projects—Self-Control Removal System and Bystander MR—as applications of the proposed design patterns and design techniques. Audience studies of Bystander MR demonstrated that the proposed design techniques effectively evoke both emotional arousal and reflection. Overall, this thesis presents a cohesive integration of theoretical innovation and artistic practice, offering a novel synthesis of personal narrative, interactive media design, and psychotherapeutic methodology within an artistic context.

Date of Award	19 Aug 2025
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	City University of Hong Kong
Supervisor	Alvaro CASSINELLI (Supervisor) & Christian SANDOR (Supervisor)