Quality of Child-Robot Interaction for Pupils with Autism Across Multiple Sessions

We ran a study examining how socially assistive robots can help children with autism in their education at school. Twenty pupils at a special school in Norway used a repertoire of different activities centered around a NAO robot. We present the complete study design and the types of data that have been collected. We then focus on presenting the results from rating the quality of child-robot interaction in the 55 recorded sessions from the study. Three raters rated each session on the quality of interaction between the child and robot, with two to four sessions for each pupil. Raters were in substantial agreement. We calculated the average quality of interaction and calculated the change of quality over the sessions and found that most children had a positive or fair quality of interaction with the robot. Discussions with teachers also provided additional insight into the sessions. Overall, the repertoire can lead to good interaction with pupils, but it is necessary to involve teachers and parents in deciding if it is appropriate for a pupil.