Developing play scenarios for tactile interaction with a humanoid robot : A case study exploration with children with autism

The work presented in this paper is part of our investigation in the ROBOSKIN project. The paper presents the completion of the first phase towards skin-based robot assisted play that included a literature review, exploratory studies and building play scenarios. The review highlights aspects of the social and the sensory impairments of children with autism, and provides the background knowledge and context for developing tactile human-robot play scenarios that are appropriate to this specific user group. The paper reports on higher-level user requirements for skin based interaction for these children alongside their exploratory studies with the humanoid robot KASPAR. This is followed by the presentation of an initial play scenario that is based on turn taking and imitation games, together with the related educational and therapeutic objectives relevant for children with autism.