Jointly structuring triadic spaces of meaning and action:book sharing from 3 months on

This study explores the emergence of triadic interactions through the example of book sharing. As part of a naturalistic study, 10 infants were visited in their homes from 3-12 months. We report that (1) book sharing as a form of infant-caregiver-object interaction occurred from as early as 3 months. Using qualitative video analysis at a micro-level adapting methodologies from conversation and interaction analysis, we demonstrate that caregivers and infants practiced book sharing in a highly co-ordinated way, with caregivers carving out interaction units and shaping actions into action arcs and infants actively participating and co-ordinating their attention between mother and object from the beginning. We also (2) sketch a developmental trajectory of book sharing over the first year and show that the quality and dynamics of book sharing interactions underwent considerable change as the ecological situation was transformed in parallel with the infants' development of attention and motor skills. Social book sharing interactions reached an early peak at 6 months with the infants becoming more active in the coordination of attention between caregiver and book. From 7-9 months, the infants shifted their interest largely to solitary object exploration, in parallel with newly emerging postural and object manipulation skills, disrupting the social coordination and the cultural frame of book sharing. In the period from 9-12 months, social book interactions resurfaced, as infants began to effectively integrate object actions within the socially shared activity. In conclusion, to fully understand the development and qualities of triadic cultural activities such as book sharing, we need to look especially at the hitherto overlooked early period from 4-6 months, and investigate how shared spaces of meaning and action are structured together in and through interaction, creating the substrate for continuing cooperation and cultural learning

A Pilot Study with a Novel Setup for Collaborative Play of the Humanoid Robot KASPAR with children with autism

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.This article describes a pilot study in which a novel experimental setup, involving an autonomous humanoid robot, KASPAR, participating in a collaborative, dyadic video game, was implemented and tested with children with autism, all of whom had impairments in playing socially and communicating with others. The children alternated between playing the collaborative video game with a neurotypical adult and playing the same game with the humanoid robot, being exposed to each condition twice. The equipment and experimental setup were designed to observe whether the children would engage in more collaborative behaviours while playing the video game and interacting with the adult than performing the same activities with the humanoid robot. The article describes the development of the experimental setup and its first evaluation in a small-scale exploratory pilot study. The purpose of the study was to gain experience with the operational limits of the robot as well as the dyadic video game, to determine what changes should be made to the systems, and to gain experience with analyzing the data from this study in order to conduct a more extensive evaluation in the future. Based on our observations of the childrens’ experiences in playing the cooperative game, we determined that while the children enjoyed both playing the game and interacting with the robot, the game should be made simpler to play as well as more explicitly collaborative in its mechanics. Also, the robot should be more explicit in its speech as well as more structured in its interactions. Results show that the children found the activity to be more entertaining, appeared more engaged in playing, and displayed better collaborative behaviours with their partners (For the purposes of this article, ‘partner’ refers to the human/robotic agent which interacts with the children with autism. We are not using the term’s other meanings that refer to specific relationships or emotional involvement between two individuals.) in the second sessions of playing with human adults than during their first sessions. One way of explaining these findings is that the children’s intermediary play session with the humanoid robot impacted their subsequent play session with the human adult. However, another longer and more thorough study would have to be conducted in order to better re-interpret these findings. Furthermore, although the children with autism were more interested in and entertained by the robotic partner, the children showed more examples of collaborative play and cooperation while playing with the human adult.Peer reviewe

Interaction Histories and Short-Term Memory: Enactive Development of Turn-Taking Behaviours in a Childlike Humanoid Robot

In this article, an enactive architecture is described that allows a humanoid robot to learn to compose simple actions into turn-taking behaviours while playing interaction games with a human partner. The robot’s action choices are reinforced by social feedback from the human in the form of visual attention and measures of behavioural synchronisation. We demonstrate that the system can acquire and switch between behaviours learned through interaction based on social feedback from the human partner. The role of reinforcement based on a short-term memory of the interaction was experimentally investigated. Results indicate that feedback based only on the immediate experience was insufficient to learn longer, more complex turn-taking behaviours. Therefore, some history of the interaction must be considered in the acquisition of turn-taking, which can be efficiently handled through the use of short-term memory.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Emerging issues and current trends in assistive technology use 2007-1010: practising, assisting and enabling learning for all

Following an earlier review in 2007, a further review of the academic literature relating to the uses of assistive technology (AT) by children and young people was completed, covering the period 2007-2011. As in the earlier review, a tripartite taxonomy: technology uses to train or practise, technology uses to assist learning and technology uses to enable learning, was used in order to structure the findings. The key markers for research in this field and during these three years were user involvement, AT on mobile mainstream devices, the visibility of AT, technology for interaction and collaboration, new and developing interfaces and inclusive design principles. The paper concludes by locating these developments within the broader framework of the Digital Divide