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Article published In:
Interaction Studies
Vol. 23:1 (2022) ► pp.1–20

Imitation, focus of attention and social behaviours of children with autism spectrum disorder in interaction with robots

| University of Zagreb
| University of Zagreb
| University Hospital of Split
| University of Zagreb

Many studies have shown that using robot platforms can be effective for teaching children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The aim of this study was to compare performance on an imitation task, as well as focus attention levels and the presence of social behaviours of children with ASD and typically developing (TD) children during an imitation task under two different conditions, with robots and human demonstrators. The results suggested that TD children did not imitate more than children with ASD. Children with ASD did not imitate the robot more than they imitated a person, but they showed more focused attention to robots and expressed more social behaviours in interaction with the robots. Behaviours that were significantly more present in ASD children than in TD children included touching the robot in the robot demonstrator condition and focusing on the robot in the person demonstrator condition. This implies a possible preference of children with ASD towards robots rather than towards people.

Keywords: imitation, autism spectrum disorder, humanoid robot
Article outline
  • Imitation as the backbone of acquiring new social skills in infants and young children
  • Social assistive robotics in children with ASD
  • Robot use for imitation learning and elicitation of social behaviours in children with ASD
  • Methods
    • Participants
    • Procedure
  • Results
  • Discussion
  • Acknowledgments
  • References
Published online: 20 October 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/is.21037.sim
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