Socialization between toddlers and robots at an early childhood education center

TLDR

Initially, children treated the robot differently than they treated each other. A state‑of‑the‑art social robot was immersed in a toddler classroom for over five months. Interaction quality rose over 27 sessions, fell during 15 sessions when the robot behaved predictably, and rebounded in the final three sessions when its full repertoire was restored; after five months the toddlers treated the robot as a peer, indicating that current robot technology can achieve sustained autonomous bonding and socialization with toddlers and holds promise for educational settings.

Abstract

A state-of-the-art social robot was immersed in a classroom of toddlers for >5 months. The quality of the interaction between children and robots improved steadily for 27 sessions, quickly deteriorated for 15 sessions when the robot was reprogrammed to behave in a predictable manner, and improved in the last three sessions when the robot displayed again its full behavioral repertoire. Initially, the children treated the robot very differently than the way they treated each other. By the last sessions, 5 months later, they treated the robot as a peer rather than as a toy. Results indicate that current robot technology is surprisingly close to achieving autonomous bonding and socialization with human toddlers for sustained periods of time and that it could have great potential in educational settings assisting teachers and enriching the classroom environment.