What activity analysis looks at

Activity analysis can include many layers, but a practical session version often starts with a few simple questions:

  • What is the activity goal?
  • What objects or information does the person need?
  • What steps are involved?
  • What choices are required?
  • What visual, memory, attention, sequencing, or planning demands are present?
  • What prompts might be useful?
  • What can be simplified or made more challenging?
  • What will be reviewed afterwards?

This kind of thinking helps you choose an activity that fits the session, rather than choosing a task because it looks interesting.

Example: object sorting

A sorting activity may look simple, but activity analysis reveals several demands.

The person may need to:

  • understand the rule
  • identify relevant objects
  • ignore distractors
  • hold the category in mind
  • select and move items
  • notice errors
  • continue until the task is complete

You can vary the number of objects, the similarity between categories, whether the rule is visible, and how much prompting is available.

Review questions:

  • Was the rule understood?
  • Were objects grouped consistently?
  • Did the person notice and correct errors?
  • Did prompts change the activity?

A visual search activity asks the person to find relevant information in a scene. Activity analysis helps you decide what kind of search demand you are creating.

The activity may involve:

  • target recognition
  • scanning the whole scene
  • managing distractors
  • remembering what to find
  • checking missed areas
  • deciding when the task is finished

A simple search task can become more complex if objects are small, peripheral, visually similar, or spread across the environment.

Review questions:

  • Where did the person look first?
  • Were some areas missed?
  • Were distractors selected?
  • Did the person check before finishing?

Example: everyday simulation

An everyday simulation might involve making a simple choice, collecting objects, following a short routine, or completing a task-like sequence.

Activity analysis can help you identify whether the session focus is object recognition, sequencing, planning, attention, memory, confidence with the headset, or discussion afterwards.

The same activity can create different session material depending on how you use it.

Review questions:

  • Which step shaped the activity?
  • Was the person able to start independently?
  • Did object placement affect how the person worked through the task?
  • What would you simplify or vary next time?

Activity analysis and graded challenge

Graded challenge works best when the therapist knows what demand is being changed. If an activity is made harder by adding more objects, changing the rule, increasing visual clutter, and reducing prompts all at once, it becomes difficult to know what mattered.

A clearer approach is to vary one thing at a time.

You might change:

  • object number
  • visual load
  • step count
  • prompt timing
  • rule clarity
  • sequence length
  • repetition
  • time available, if relevant

This keeps the activity readable and helps the review stay useful.

Using activity analysis with VR and AR

In immersive activity sessions, activity analysis should include spatial demands. You may need to consider whether the person has to turn, reach, scan, compare locations, search behind or beside them, or move attention between parts of the scene.

These spatial demands are part of what makes VR and AR different from flat-screen or paper-based activities. The person is not only viewing the task. They are interacting with the space around them.

What Studio can add

CorteXR Studio gives therapists configurable VR and AR activities that can be analysed, selected, varied, supervised, and reviewed. Visual search, sorting, sequencing, memory, attention, and everyday simulations each create different activity demands.

Studio can also support review by showing activity information such as object choices, prompts, retries, completion, and how the task unfolded. That information should be used alongside your own observation and judgement.

What Studio does not do

Studio does not replace professional reasoning. It does not diagnose, assess, treat, monitor, or measure outcomes. Activity analysis remains your work as the therapist.

The software gives you structured activity material. You decide what it means.

Turning analysis into a session choice

Activity analysis is most useful when it leads to a practical decision. After breaking down a task, choose the part that matters most for the session. If the key demand is visual search, start there. If the key demand is step order, choose a sequencing activity. If the key demand is rule use, use sorting. If the key demand is discussion, choose an everyday simulation that creates clear moments to review.

This prevents a session from becoming too broad. The activity has a job to do, and the review can stay focused on that job.

Building an activity plan

A simple activity plan can make analysis easier to use in practice. Before the session, write down the activity goal, the main demand, the likely challenge, the prompt plan, and the review point.

For example:

  • Goal: find target kitchen objects.
  • Main demand: visual search across the scene.
  • Challenge: objects placed in different areas with mild distractors.
  • Prompt plan: wait, ask the person to look again, cue the missed area if needed.
  • Review point: search pattern, missed areas, prompts, and object choices.

That plan does not need to be formal. It simply keeps the activity from becoming vague.

Analysing the environment

In VR and AR activities, the environment is part of the task. A scene can be simple, busy, familiar, unfamiliar, object-rich, or spatially spread out. It can ask the person to look in front of them, to one side, across a surface, or around a room-like space.

Activity analysis should include these environmental demands. If an activity becomes harder, the reason may not be the number of steps. It may be visual clutter, object position, unfamiliar layout, or the need to scan a wider space.

This matters because it gives you more precise ways to change the activity next time.

Analysing support

Support is not only whether you helped. It is how you helped.

You might use:

  • extra time
  • a general reminder of the goal
  • a prompt to scan again
  • a cue towards one area
  • a direct instruction
  • a simplified version of the task
  • repetition of the same activity

Recording or reviewing the type of support can be more useful than simply noting that support was needed. It gives you a clearer picture of how the activity unfolded.

Connecting analysis to Studio review

Studio can provide review material such as task completion, object choices, prompts, retries, activity history, and elements of how the person interacted with the scene. Activity analysis gives that information context.

For example, a missed object means different things depending on where it was placed, how visible it was, what the person had been asked to remember, and whether the activity had already changed rules.

The therapist’s analysis turns activity information into session understanding.

Reviewing the analysis after the session

Activity analysis should continue after the activity ends. Ask whether the activity created the session material you expected. Did the main demand appear? Was the task too complex? Did the person understand the goal? Did prompts help? Was there enough material to guide the next activity?

This reflection can shape the next session. You might repeat the same task with fewer objects, change the scene, add a clearer prompt, choose a different activity family, or keep the same activity but focus on a different review question.

The value of analysis is not a longer form. It is a clearer link between the activity you chose, what happened, and what you decide to do next.

A simple activity analysis template

A useful template can be brief: activity goal, objects, steps, main demand, prompt plan, review question, and next variation. This is enough to keep the session focused without turning preparation into paperwork.

For Studio activities, add one more line: spatial demand. Note whether the person needs to scan, turn, reach, compare locations, or return to a missed area. That one line can make the next activity choice clearer.

Explore CorteXR Studio

Studio gives occupational therapists configurable VR and AR activities for supervised sessions, with review material and optional managed headset support.

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Studio note: CorteXR Studio is non-medical activity software for therapist-led sessions. It is not intended to diagnose, treat, monitor, prevent, or alleviate any disease, injury, or impairment.

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