IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2016 - 54

ISTOCK

Robot Enhanced
Therapy for
Children with
Autism
Disorders
Measuring Ethical Acceptability
Andreea Peca, Mark Coeckelbergh, Ramona Simut, Cristina Costescu,
Sebastian Pintea, Daniel David, and Bram Vanderborght

C

hildren with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have persistent deficits
in social communication and social
interaction, as well as restricted,
repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities [1]. The prevalence of autism is estimated at 1-2
per 1000, and close to 6 per 1000 for ASD [23]. ASD
is a lifelong disorder, and many individuals need
high levels of support throughout their lives [28].
Even though no cure has been found, early intervention is critical for a positive long-term outcome. The
interventions that have received the most empirical
support are early behavioral interventions. They
usually involve one-on-one training provided by a
therapist, in which children are trained to respond
to environmental changes, understand and use lan-

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MTS.2016.2554701
Date of publication: 2 June 2016

54

1932-4529/16©2016IEEE

guage, and interact appropriately with others in social settings [8].
In the last two decades, an increasing number of
studies have explored how robots can be used in the
therapy of children with ASD. The goal is to use robots
as a means to affect the social and communicative
behavior of children with autism for either assessment
or therapeutic purposes [33]. It is assumed that robots
may represent an optimal social skill learning environment, because individuals with ASD 1) show strengths
in understanding the physical, object-related world and
weaknesses in understanding the social world, 2) are
more responsive to feedback given by a computer than
a human, and 3) are more interested in treatment
involving technology/robots [10]. This new research
field is termed socially assistive robotics (SAR). Furthermore, social robots may be designed to reduce the
workload of the therapists by monitoring multiple desirable and problematic behaviors and providing quantitative assessments.

IEEE TEchnology and SocIETy MagazInE

∕

june 2016



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