Planning Based System for Child-Robot Interaction in Dynamic Play Environments

TL;DR

This paper proposes a planning-based robotic system designed for naturalistic, socially aware child-robot interactions in dynamic play environments, integrating child development theories and emotional models.

Contribution

It introduces a novel dynamic interaction framework that considers socio-emotional states for autonomous planning in child-robot play scenarios.

Findings

Initial empirical results demonstrate effective social interaction during collaborative tasks.

The framework successfully adapts to children's emotional states during play.

The system shows promise for enhancing naturalistic child-robot engagement.

Abstract

This paper describes the initial steps towards the design of a robotic system that intends to perform actions autonomously in a naturalistic play environment. At the same time it aims for social human-robot interaction~(HRI), focusing on children. We draw on existing theories of child development and on dimensional models of emotions to explore the design of a dynamic interaction framework for natural child-robot interaction. In this dynamic setting, the social HRI is defined by the ability of the system to take into consideration the socio-emotional state of the user and to plan appropriately by selecting appropriate strategies for execution. The robot needs a temporal planning system, which combines features of task-oriented actions and principles of social human robot interaction. We present initial results of an empirical study for the evaluation of the proposed framework in the context of a collaborative sorting game.