Technology
Meet the robot that's helping autistic children to socialise more easily
Embracing a simple appearance and basic capabilities, Kaspar eschews cutting-edge robotics to help autistic children practise the interactions most of us take for granted.
Developing social skills is a big part of growing up, but for many children with autism, these skills can be hard to come by. Kaspar is on a mission to change that. Known as the social robot, Kaspar is a child-sized interactive humanoid that unlocks social skills in autistic children by enabling them to practice everyday interactions.
Purposefully of a simplistic design that's focused around basic expressions and movements, Kaspar creates a safe space by allowing its users to experience uncomplicated, predictable and stress-free interactions, as seen in the video below.
We caught up with lead on the project, Dr. Ben Robins, to discover why Kaspar's distinct design has been such a success, and the remarkable story of how he and his team got there.
"In psychology, the term generalisation is used to describe the transfer of skills from one context to another context," Robins explains. "People with autism have a problem doing that. Our aim is to see if we can help autistic children with the generalisation process for social skills."
Starting in 1998, the team that would go on to produce Kaspar were pioneers. No one was investigating how robots could encourage social interactions and communication skills so Robins admits that much of what they did was trial and error. Nonetheless, under the leadership of Robins, the Kaspar team would go on to produce a study that not only changed their way of thinking, but also that of many others globally.
"I used to work with the children using a doll-like humanoid called Robota," says Robins. "One day someone asked me why I couldn't just work with a human dressed as a robot. So I went to Covent Garden in London and found a mime artist. I put some money in his hat along with a note saying I wanted to hire him."
Replacing the Robota doll, the mime artist was placed in the children's playroom, and was told to ignore them completely and only use a specific set of limited movements (ones similar to those the Robota doll was capable of).
"The children completely ignored him," details Robins. "So we did it again. However, this time the mime artist was dressed similar to a robot, but with very little detail. We introduce the children to the room again and they immediately ran over and began exploring and interacting with him. It was like day and night."
Robins then repeated the experiment with the Robota doll, by adapting it with a mask and plain clothing. "The results were almost identical," he says. "We determined that when the robot was of a plain appearance, the children felt much more relaxed and therefore far better at interacting with it. That was when we realised these interactions could potentially improve how the children socialised with others in their lives."
Armed with this new understanding, Robins and his team went on to create Kaspar in 2005.
Dr. Ben Robins leads the Kaspar project
© Kaspar
"Kaspar's features are human but simplified. We knew that it was important to retain the human element, as the whole purpose of the device is to improve human-to-human interactions," explains Robins. "It's also important that Kaspar is a 3D-object. This means that the child can physically explore it, and learn to make the connection between Kaspar, themselves and other people."
Kaspar's pre-programmed capabilities are all controlled via a remote control, which is placed in the hands of the child. With the user able to control Kaspar, they can control – and therefore predict – both sides of the interaction. This feature also enables Kaspar to be used by two children at once, which has been a crucial part of its success.
"This is why we call Kaspar a robotic social mediator," says Robins. "We play an imitation game, where the children take it in turns to control the robot while the other copies its performance. This may not sound like much to some, but considering that many of the children we work with have no social skills and huge difficulty sharing, it's a massive achievement for them."
As time has gone by, the technology behind robotics has significantly improved, but for Robins, Kaspar wouldn't be as effective if it was autonomous or had an uncanny human resemblance. That being said, the device has come a long way since 2005.
"The more recent versions of Kaspar have touch sensors, which has enabled it to encourage and discourage certain behaviours," says Robins. "Some autistic children can have issues with violence. Kaspar is capable of saying 'ouch' when it senses that the child is not playing nicely, and can twist to the side to look like it's cowering. This then teaches the child that it can't do the same to other children. Kaspar is all about providing a safe environment for the child to learn without consequences."
Even though Robins has been working on Kaspar for so many years, he still admits to learning as he goes. From the perspective that every child is different, Robins is continually adapting Kaspar to the unique needs of its users. "A big focus for us is to see how Kaspar can complement the existing work done in a home or school," he says. "One time we worked with children who had difficulties with food. We then introduced food-based games and dialogue to Kaspar, which helped to encourage the children to eat."
Particularly from this example, it's clear to see how Kaspar can benefit other areas, as well as social skills. So what could be next. "We want to explore speech development – there are more children with language impairment than autism," Robins says. "We'd also like to see how Kaspar could be used to aid distressed children during interviews with the police or social services."
There's definitely huge potential for this technology elsewhere. We'll keep an eye out to see where else Robins and the Kaspar team can provide support.