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Robotic animals might aid in the social development of children with autism

Published: 12 March 2008 Publication History
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    This study investigated whether a robotic dog might aid in the social development of children with autism. Eleven children diagnosed with autism (ages 5-8) interacted with the robotic dog AIBO and, during a different period within the same experimental session, a simple mechanical toy dog (Kasha), which had no ability to detect or respond to its physical or social environment. Results showed that, in comparison to Kasha, the children spoke more words to AIBO, and more often engaged in three types of behavior with AIBO typical of children without autism: verbal engagement, reciprocal interaction, and authentic interaction. In addition, we found suggestive evidence (with p values ranging from .07 to .09) that the children interacted more with AIBO, and, while in the AIBO session, engaged in fewer autistic behaviors. Discussion focuses on why robotic animals might benefit children with autism.

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    cover image ACM Conferences
    HRI '08: Proceedings of the 3rd ACM/IEEE international conference on Human robot interaction
    March 2008
    402 pages
    ISBN:9781605580173
    DOI:10.1145/1349822
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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    Publication History

    Published: 12 March 2008

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    Author Tags

    1. aibo
    2. animals
    3. autism
    4. reciprocity
    5. robots
    6. social development

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    HRI '08
    HRI '08: International Conference on Human Robot Interaction
    March 12 - 15, 2008
    Amsterdam, The Netherlands

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    • (2024)Analysis of the Application of the Bee-Bot Robot for the Development of Social Reciprocity Skills in Students with Autism Spectrum DisorderInternational Journal of Social Robotics10.1007/s12369-024-01099-0Online publication date: 13-Feb-2024
    • (2024)Effectiveness of Robotic Intervention on Improving Social Development and Participation of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder – A Randomised Controlled TrialJournal of Autism and Developmental Disorders10.1007/s10803-024-06236-2Online publication date: 17-Jan-2024
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