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Periods of heightened arousal or restlessness can interfere with children's ability to focus, self-regulation, and physically calm. Technologies that encourage embodied self-regulation through tactile interaction may provide a simple and…
A common denominator for most therapy treatments for children who suffer from an anxiety disorder is daily practice routines to learn techniques needed to overcome anxiety. However, applying those techniques while experiencing anxiety can…
Many children experience challenges in emotional regulation and social interaction, which can limit their participation in everyday activities and therapeutic programs. For socially assistive robots to be effective in this context, it is…
Tactile interaction plays an essential role in human-to-human interaction. People gain comfort and support from tactile interactions with others and touch is an important predictor for trust. While touch has been explored as a communicative…
Tactile interaction plays a crucial role in interactions between people. Touch can, for example, help people calm down and lower physiological stress responses. Consequently, it is believed that tactile and haptic interaction matter also in…
Social assistive robots are starting to be widely used in pediatric health-care environments with the aim of distracting and entertaining children, and so of reducing a possible state of anxiety. In this paper, we present some initial…
This paper reviews the use of socially interactive robots to assist in the therapy of children with autism. The extent to which the robots were successful in helping the children in their social, emotional, and communication deficits was…
We found that children in elementary school often experience stress during task performance. Limited coping skills and lack of stress awareness restrict children's ability to manage their stress. Many designs and studies have proposed…
Research in child-robot interactions suggests that engaging in "care-taking" of a social robot, such as tucking the robot in at night, can strengthen relationships formed between children and robots. In this work, we aim to better…
This study centers around the design and implementation of the Maya Robot, a portable elephant-shaped social robot, intended to engage with children undergoing cancer treatment. Initial efforts were devoted to enhancing the robot's facial…
Socially Assistive Robots are studied in different Child-Robot Interaction settings. However, logistical constraints limit accessibility, particularly affecting timely support for mental wellbeing. In this work, we have investigated whether…
The sense of family connectedness may support positive outcomes including individual well-being, resilience, and healthy family functioning. However, as technologies advance, they often replace human-human interactions instead of nurturing…
Robot-assisted therapy is an emerging form of therapy for autistic children, although designing effective robot behaviors is a challenge for effective implementation of such therapy. A series of usability tests assessed trends in the…
Mental health and psychological distress are rising in adults, showing the importance of wellbeing promotion, support, and technique practice that is effective and accessible. Interactive social robots have been tested to deliver health…
Physical interactions with socially assistive robots (SARs) positively affect user wellbeing. However, haptic experiences when touching a SAR are typically limited to perceiving the robot's movements or shell texture, while other modalities…
To design social robots to effectively promote health behavior change, it is essential to understand how people respond to various health communication strategies employed by these robots. This study examines the effectiveness of two types…
Affective touch offers positive psychological and physiological benefits such as the mitigation of stress and pain. If a robot could realize human-like affective touch, it would open up new application areas, including supporting care work.…
Recent studies have revealed that using social robots can accelerate the learning process of several skills in areas where autistic children typically show deficits. However, most early research studies conducted interactions via free play.…
Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder find robots easier to communicate with than humans. Thus, robots have been introduced in autism therapies. However, due to the environmental complexity, the used robots often have to be controlled…
This study examines whether engagement with social robots translates into improved human-directed social abilities in autistic children. We conducted an 8-week home-based randomized controlled trial with 40 children aged 5--9 using a…