from Wired magazine:<\/i><\/p>\n
Children with autism are often described as robotic: They are emotionless. They engage in obsessive, repetitive behavior and have trouble communicating and socializing.<\/p>\n
Now, a humanoid robot designed to teach autistic children social skills has begun testing in British schools.<\/p>\n
Known as KASPAR (Kinesics and Synchronisation in Personal Assistant Robotics), the $4.33 million bot smiles, simulates surprise and sadness, gesticulates and, the researchers hope, will encourage social interaction amongst autistic children.<\/p>\n
Developed as part of the pan-European IROMEC (Interactive Robotic Social Mediators as Companions ) project, KASPAR has two “eyes” fitted with video cameras and a mouth that can open and smile.<\/p>\n
Children with autism have difficulty understanding and interpreting people’s facial expressions and body language, says Dr. Ben Robins, a senior research fellow at the University of Hertfordshire’s Adaptive Systems Research Group, who leads the multi-national team behind KASPAR.<\/p>\n
“Human interaction can be very subtle, with even the smallest eyebrow raise, for example, having different meanings in different contexts,” Robins said. “It is thought that autistic children cut themselves off from interacting with other humans because, for them, this is too much information and it is too confusing for them to understand.”<\/p>\n
With this in mind, the team designed KASPAR to express emotion consistently and with the minimum of complexity.<\/p>\n
KASPAR’s face is made of silicon-rubber supported on an aluminum frame. Eight degrees of freedom in the head and neck and six in the arms and hands enable movement.<\/p>\n
The researchers hope that the end result is a human-like robot that can act as a “social mediator” for autistic children, a steppingstone to improved social interaction with other children and adults.<\/p>\n
“KASPAR provides autistic children with reliability and predictability. Since there are no surprises, they feel safe and secure,” Robins said, adding that the purpose is not to replace human interaction and contact but to enhance it.<\/p>\n
Robins has already tested some imitation and turn-taking games with the children and his preliminary findings are positive.<\/p>\n
“When I first started testing, the children treated me like a fly on the wall,” he said. “But each one of them, in their own time, started to open themselves up to me. One child in particular, after weeks on end of ignoring me, came and sat in my lap and then took my hand and brought me to the robot, to share the experience of KASPAR with me.”<\/p>\n