Could NAO Robot Function as Model Demonstrating Joint Attention Skills for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder? An Exploratory Study

H.L. Cao*, R.E. Simut, Noralie Krepel, B. Vanderborght, J. Vanderfaeillie

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Previous studies reported that children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show a certain interest in social robots. This makes social robots potential to be a model to teach social skills. This exploratory study aims to investigate whether three types of joint attention skills (i.e., eye-contact, pointing, gaze-following) could be improved for five preschoolers with ASD using an evidence-based robot-modeling intervention with a humanoid social robot NAO. Our observation shows that these children were motivated when interacting with NAO by following and responding correctly to NAO's joint attention behaviors. Although some improvements were found, no pattern or systematic effect could be revealed. In the future, more evidence-based studies are needed to investigate the benefits of robot-assisted therapy more deeply.
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages22
JournalInternational Journal of Humanoid Robotics
Volume19
Issue number4
Early online date11 May 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Aug 2022

Keywords

  • Robot-assisted therapy
  • model
  • joint attention
  • autism spectrum disorder
  • evidence-base
  • YOUNG-CHILDREN
  • INDIVIDUALS
  • TASK

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