Robot Design for Young Children

幼儿机器人设计

• 批准号: RGPIN-2022-05038
• 负责人: Geiskkovitch, Denise
• 金额: $ 1.82万
• 依托单位: McMaster University
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=750431
• 关键词: Robot; Design; Young; Children

Social robots are emerging into environments with young children, such as daycares, schools, hospitals, and homes, where they are designed to use human-like social techniques. Emerging research highlights that these child-robot interactions can surprisingly often lead to negative and inappropriate interactions, such as bullying or over-trust. I argue that this results directly from robots being designed for young children, without the field having the tools or knowledge of how to appropriately do so; recent findings demonstrate that robots need to be designed specifically for children, yet we do not know how. As a field we need to develop robot guidelines and behaviours that are specifically designed for children. The long-term goal of my work is to move the field forward in knowing how to design robots for young children. Through this work, I will develop prescriptive frameworks to guide design and interaction behaviours of robots for home and school use with young children. My work uses novel methods for assessing child-robot interaction with preschool-aged children, a largely understudied user group in Human-Computer Interaction and Human-Robot Interaction. Scientific approach I employ standard Human-Computer Interaction and Human-Robot Interaction methodology, drawing where needed from Psychology, Sociology, and Linguistics. I will (a) conduct user-centred and co-design workshops with young children to help ensure that robot designs match expectations and conceptual models of robots, (b) conduct a series of laboratory and field experiments to develop frameworks of children's expectations, interactions, and caveats with robots, helping to better understand what we might expect when young children interact with robots, and develop measurement tools to assess the appropriateness of robot behaviours, and (c) develop and test new robot behaviours for interaction with children at home and daycare. Specifically, I will focus on the following components: (1) Social Components of Interaction - aspects such as likability, friendliness, information sharing (2) Logistical Requirements - aspects such as microphone placement, child-specific language, robot abilities, robot errors (3) Outcomes of Interaction - aspects such as trust, friendship, usefulness, respect This research program will the first in Canada (and one of few in the world) that investigates how to design interactive robotic technologies for preschool-aged children. Through my work, I will develop new interaction paradigms, and research methodologies to investigate them, moving forward the fields of Human-Robot Interaction and Human-Computer Interaction. My research will also provide the necessary knowledge to be able to implement robots that lead to positive outcomes with young children, preventing the short- (and potentially) long-term negative developmental outcomes that are seen with currently available robots.

社交机器人正在出现在有幼儿的环境中，比如日托、学校、医院和家庭，在这些环境中，它们被设计成使用类似人类的社交技术。新兴的研究强调，这些孩子与机器人的互动往往会出人意料地导致消极和不适当的互动，比如欺凌或过度信任。我认为，这直接是因为机器人是为儿童设计的，而这个领域没有工具或知识来适当地做到这一点；最近的研究结果表明，机器人需要专门为儿童设计，但我们不知道如何设计。作为一个领域，我们需要制定专门为儿童设计的机器人指南和行为。我工作的长期目标是推动该领域向前发展，了解如何为幼儿设计机器人。通过这项工作，我将开发规范性框架来指导家庭和学校与幼儿使用机器人的设计和交互行为。我的工作使用新颖的方法来评估儿童-机器人与学龄前儿童的交互，学龄前儿童是人机交互和人机交互中一个很大程度上未被充分研究的用户群体。科学方法我采用标准的人机交互和人机交互方法，在需要的地方借鉴心理学、社会学和语言学。我将(a)与幼儿进行以用户为中心和共同设计的研讨会，以帮助确保机器人设计符合期望和机器人的概念模型；(b)进行一系列实验室和现场实验，以制定儿童对机器人的期望、互动和警告的框架，帮助更好地理解当幼儿与机器人互动时，我们可能会期望什么，并开发测量工具来评估机器人行为的适当性。(c)开发和测试新的机器人行为，用于与家庭和日托中心的儿童互动。具体而言，我将重点关注以下组成部分：(1)互动的社会组成部分-如可爱性，友好性，信息共享等方面(2)后勤要求-如麦克风放置，儿童特定语言，机器人能力，机器人错误等方面(3)互动的结果-如信任，友谊，有用性，尊重等方面这个研究项目将是加拿大第一个（也是世界上为数不多的）研究如何为学龄前儿童设计互动机器人技术的项目。通过我的工作，我将开发新的交互范式，并研究方法来研究它们，推动人机交互和人机交互领域的发展。我的研究还将提供必要的知识，使机器人能够对幼儿产生积极的影响，防止目前可用的机器人所带来的短期（和潜在的）长期负面发展结果。