Reducing negative emotions in children using social robots: systematic review

Background: For many children, visiting the hospital can lead to a state of increased anxiety. Social robots are being explored as a possible tool to reduce anxiety and distress in children attending a clinical or hospital environment. Social robots are designed to communicate and interact through movement, music and speech. Objective: This systematic review aims at assessing the current evidence on the types of social robots used and their impact on children’s anxiety or distress levels when visiting the hospital for outpatient appointments or planned admissions. Methods: Databases such as MEDLINE, PubMed, IEEE Xplore, Web of Science, PsychINFO and Google Scholar were queried for papers published between January 2009 and August 2020 reporting the use of social robots interacting with children in hospital or clinical environments. Results: A total of 10 studies were located and included. Across these 10 studies, 7 different types of robots were used. Anxiety and distress were found to be reduced in the children who interacted with a social robot. Conclusions: Overall, the evidence suggests that social robots hold a promising role in reducing levels of anxiety or distress in children visiting the hospital. However, research on social robots is at an early stage and requires further studies to strengthen the evidence base

Social Robots in Hospitals: A Systematic Review

Hospital environments are facing new challenges this century. One of the most important is the quality of services to patients. Social robots are gaining prominence due to the advantages they offer; in particular, several of their main uses have proven beneficial during the pandemic. This study aims to shed light on the current status of the design of social robots and their interaction with patients. To this end, a systematic review was conducted using WoS and MEDLINE, and the results were exhaustive analyzed. The authors found that most of the initiatives and projects serve the el- derly and children, and specifically, that they helped these groups fight diseases such as dementia, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), cancer, and diabetes

The Potential use of Social Robots in Acute Paediatric Settings: A mixed-methods exploration of feasibility, acceptance, and utility.

The hospital can be an anxious place for paediatric patients. Reducing and managing anxiety in children is important; finding tools and interventions to support this is essential to the healthcare of paediatric patients. Social robots offer a new way of interacting with children and have the potential to reduce negative emotions. Even though research has found that social robots could potentially be an anxiety-preventing tool, there is no research exploring how children play in hospital settings and which features are required for social robots to impact paediatric patients positively. There are also gaps regarding parents of paediatric patients' and healthcare professionals' views on social robots and how they feel about using them as a tool within a hospital setting. This thesis examined the feasibility of using social robots in four hospital settings to address this gap. Observations of paediatric patients revealed the importance of tactile play and games with rules as popular forms of interaction with social robots. Questionnaires and interviews gathered feedback from paediatric patients, parents, and healthcare professionals. Overall, the response to social robots was positive, with parents and healthcare professionals acknowledging their potential benefits in reducing anxiety. However, some paediatric patients did not find the social robot relaxing, and there were mixed opinions on its anxiety-reducing capabilities. While parents noticed a change in their children's negative moods and enjoyed the interaction, a few were uncertain about anxiety reduction. Healthcare professionals expressed excitement about social robots but sought further clarity on their practical implementation in a hospital setting. Despite the promising aspects, this thesis highlights the need for further research and development. Large-scale comparisons of social robots in diverse hospital settings and longitudinal studies with paediatric patients are warranted to gain deeper insights and enhance the practicality of using social robots as anxiety-reducing tools in paediatric care

A preliminary investigation of using humanoid social robots as non-pharmacological techniques with children

This paper presents an observational preliminary study to examine the potentialities of the humanoid social robots as non-pharmacological techniques for children. The aim of the robots is to entertain the patients, interact through voice, gestures and funny animations, in order to decrease their negative feelings, and, at the same time, to promote positive emotions. This study exploited two different humanoid social robots, Pepper and Sanbot Elf, and involved twenty-eight hospitalized patients, age 3-19, assigned randomly to one of them. We analysed the feelings of the patients in terms of several different positive and negative moods, focusing on their variation in three different times: before, during and after the procedure. We found a significant decrease of the negative feelings by a factor between 31.25% and 53.65%, and an increase of positive emotions up to 73.33%. Generally both the robots were appreciated by the most of the children: the 78.57% of the participants evaluated the experience positive and 85.71% declared that would like to play again with the robots, if they had to repeat the procedure