At Dartmouth College’s Geisel School of Medicine, the play2PREVENT (p2P) Lab is attempting to bridge that gap with the help of a $755,000 grant from the nonprofit Proof Positive. The lab is presently in the midst of a two-year initiative to create and evaluate digital health games designed specifically for students with autism, a population widely considered to be underserved in education.
The project, titled “Level Up Happiness,” seeks to move beyond traditional interventions by focusing on emotional resilience, social confidence and positive coping strategies. According to Dr. Lynn Fiellin, a physician researcher and the creator of the lab, the goal is to give students relevant content and skills they can practice in a virtual space before applying them to real-life challenges.
The p2P Lab is not new to the ed-tech arena. Founded by Fiellin at Yale in 2009 and funded primarily by the National Institutes of Health before transitioning to Dartmouth in late 2023, the lab has spent 16 years developing video games aimed at reducing harmful behaviors among adolescents. Its portfolio includes several games addressing topics such as mental health, opioid misuse and decision-making, Fiellin said.
The shift toward gaming was born from Fiellin’s clinical observations and personal experiences. While working with young people struggling with addiction, she said patients frequently said they wish they had known how to navigate challenges earlier in life. Simultaneously, she watched her own children engage deeply with complex learning games.
“I could just see how it was a space they loved being in, and they just ... were engaged and they just soaked it up,” Fiellin said.
Unlike other forms of entertainment such as television and typical video games, Fiellin emphasized that the lab cultivates what are deemed “serious games,” which she described as software designed for a primary purpose beyond play.
“The beauty with [gaming] is that, since it’s interactive, they then, as the player, have the opportunity to do something ... How do you learn to help a friend who is struggling and needs counseling? I mean, this is not something a 16-year-old necessarily knows,” Fiellin said. “They get to sort of figure out, what are the signs that somebody is struggling? How do you talk to them about that? How do you reach out to them? Can you reach out to a coach, a teacher or some other person? ... They sort of know how to do this without having necessarily suffered the negative consequences, because it’s all been virtual in the training.”
According to Proof Positive’s Chief Wellbeing Officer Katie Curran, the intersection of autism and positive psychology is under-researched.
“That’s where we see the opportunity,” she said in a news release about the project.
Curran emphasized that Level Up Happiness is not intended to replace existing clinical therapies, but complement them. By using a scientific lens to study whether these games can improve well-being, the partnership aims to provide schools with tools that are additive to the therapeutic process.
“We’re not saying these games will improve well-being. We’re studying whether they can,” Curran said. “This collaboration gives us the structure to ask the right questions and follow the data wherever it leads.”
For educators and policymakers concerned about screen time or the replacement of human instruction, Fiellin was clear: The technology is supposed to be a “human extender,” not a substitute for a teacher or counselor.
“Humans are not being replaced,” she said. “The games can deliver this, and then ... teachers and kids can talk about it or debrief or whatever is most important at that juncture.”
Logistically, Fiellen said the games are designed to be accessible, functioning on nearly any device with Wi-Fi. She noted that ease of use is intended to lower the barrier for schools that may not have the resources for traditional health education, but can integrate shorter, interactive exercises like those of p2P.
Fiellen also noted that privacy remains a top priority for district leaders and the lab itself, stating that their work operates under strict, traditional academic research protocols.
“Kids aren’t putting in any data into these games,” she said. “We focus very, very strictly on the privacy issues, making sure that ... there’s nothing out there that is identifying.”
“I’m trained as a scientist and a researcher, this is what I do. I don’t know how to do this differently,” she continued.
Moreover, she expressed skepticism toward the claims of efficacy often found in the ed-tech market, where a tool might be touted as revolutionary or unprecedented based on a handful of anecdotal reports.
“Those are testimonials. That’s not research,” Fiellin said. “Especially with kids, whatever we are having kids use for a certain purpose, we should know what these tools do.”
If the process succeeds, she added, the result will be a research-backed resource that helps autistic students flourish in the real world.
