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Comparing Robot Embodiments in a Guided Discovery Learning Interaction with Children

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Abstract

The application of social robots to the domain of education is becoming more prevalent. However, there remain a wide range of open issues, such as the effectiveness of robots as tutors on student learning outcomes, the role of social behaviour in teaching interactions, and how the embodiment of a robot influences the interaction. In this paper, we seek to explore children’s behaviour towards a robot tutor for children in a novel guided discovery learning interaction. Since the necessity of real robots (as opposed to virtual agents) in education has not been definitively established in the literature, the effect of robot embodiment is assessed. The results demonstrate that children overcome strong incorrect biases in the material to be learned, but with no significant differences between embodiment conditions. However, the data do suggest that the use of real robots carries an advantage in terms of social presence that could provide educational benefits.

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Acknowledgments

This research was partially funded by the EU FP7 ALIZ-E Project (FP7-ICT-248116), the FP7 DREAM project (FP7-ICT-611391) and the School of Computing and Maths, Plymouth University. The authors would like to thank Salisbury Road Primary School in Plymouth, U.K. for hosting the study. Gratitude also goes to Robin Read who provided assistance conducting the experiment, and to John Radnor and Marina Khalil for second coding of the videos.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Robotics and Neural Systems, Cognition Institute, Plymouth University, Plymouth, UK

    James Kennedy, Paul Baxter & Tony Belpaeme

Authors
  1. James Kennedy
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  2. Paul Baxter
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  3. Tony Belpaeme
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to James Kennedy.

Appendix: Robot Script

Appendix: Robot Script

Below is a list of the robot scripted phrases and where they occur in the interaction.

  • Robot Instructions

    • Hello! I’m Pop/Crackle.

    • Right, what we are going to be doing today is sorting out some aliens.

    • We have two species of aliens that are lost in space and we have to return them to their home planet. Okay?

    • So here we have our different types of aliens and our two planets, the purple and the orange.

    • We need to sort them into their two different groups.

    • I’d like you to see if you can guess which planets the aliens are from.

    • You can touch an alien and you drag it to the planet you think it’s from, and it’ll tell you whether you are right or not.

    • I won’t help you on your first go. Let’s see how well you can do on your own!

    • Now you can start.

  • Prior to Guided Discovery Phase

    • Lovely, well done.

    • Now I’ll give you a clue, the aliens from the purple planet all have something in common.

  • Prior to Post-Test

    • Right, we’ll do just one more set of aliens.

    • Using the practice we’ve just done, let’s see how well you can do.

    • I won’t help you this time.

    • Have a go.

  • Robot Goodbye

    • Well done. thank you very much.

    • Thank you for helping me out today.

    • You can go back to your class.

    • Goodbye!

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Kennedy, J., Baxter, P. & Belpaeme, T. Comparing Robot Embodiments in a Guided Discovery Learning Interaction with Children. Int J of Soc Robotics 7, 293–308 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12369-014-0277-4

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