A Robotic Telepresence System for Full-Time Monitoring of Children with Cognitive Disabilities

Abstract

Children with cognitive disabilities including Autism Spectrum Disorder and Cerebral Palsy are exposed to greater possibilities of injuries due to their physical limitations and consequences of disruptive behavior. Their parents and caregivers who act as guardians, are compelled to monitor them full-time in order to prevent such injuries and potential damage to the surrounds from occurring. At the same time, assistive robotics has currently made strides in aiding rehabilitation of both physical and social impairments for children with cognitive disabilities. Companion robot prototypes have been developed and tested with marginal success for maintaining repetitive reinforcement exercises for these children in between treatment sessions. Due to special affinity of these children towards robots, the final goal of this research effort seeks to examine the effectiveness of implementing and applying a robot companion prototype for the purpose of full-time activity monitoring. The robot will follow the child and log his or her activities in real-time. It shall alert the guardians whenever the visibility is lost or a dangerous activity is detected. The guardian can choose to remotely connect to the robot via telepresence to assess the situation and verbally intervene, even when physically away from the child. This paper proposes the conceptual development of the said robot prototype, for the purpose of studying its reliability in preventing injuries and its effect on allaying parenting stress.