Lend A Hand: Designing A Robot for Teaching Social Skills to Children with High-Functioning Autism

Abstract

Children with high-functioning autism (HFA) face significant challenges in developing social skills. Over the years, some technology-assisted therapies for those children were developed and have proven effective. However, in real-world practices, these therapies have limitations, such as lacking of attractiveness to children. Therefore, we propose HAN, an interactive robot designed to teach social skills to children with HFA based on TIP (Teaching Interaction Procedure) therapy. We aim to design an attractive appearance and a series of attractive interfaces to provide a better therapy experience for children with HFA. We structured social interactions through teaching, interaction, feedback, and generalization; thus, HAN systematically taught a wide range of social skills through a comprehensive curriculum. We conducted a preliminary user test at a local autism intervention center and collected valuable user feedback.