Do Shy Preschoolers Interact Differently When Learning Language With a Social Robot? An Analysis of Interactional Behavior and Word Learning.

Nils F Tolksdorf,Franziska E Viertel,Katharina J Rohlfing

doi:10.3389/frobt.2021.676123

Abstract

Temperamental traits can decisively influence how children enter into social interaction with their environment. Yet, in the field of child–robot interaction, little is known about how individual differences such as shyness impact on how children interact with social robots in educational settings. The present study systematically assessed the temperament of 28 preschool children aged 4–5 years in order to investigate the role of shyness within a dyadic child–robot interaction. Over the course of four consecutive sessions, we observed how shy compared to nonshy children interacted with a social robot during a word-learning educational setting and how shyness influenced children’s learning outcomes. Overall, results suggested that shy children not only interacted differently with a robot compared to nonshy children, but also changed their behavior over the course of the sessions. Critically, shy children interacted less expressively with the robot in general. With regard to children’s language learning outcomes, shy children scored lower on an initial posttest, but were able to close this gap on a later test, resulting in all children retrieving the learned words on a similar level. When intertest learning gain was considered, regression analyses even confirmed a positive predictive role of shyness on language learning gains. Findings are discussed with regard to the role of shyness in educational settings with social robots and the implications for future interaction design.

Highlights

Recent years have seen a substantial growth in the applicability of social robots in educational learning environments with young learners
The present study examined how shy children, compared to nonshy children, enter into and maintain social interaction with a social robot during a word-learning educational setting, and how children’s learning outcomes relate to their temperament
Most past research in child–robot interaction has tested hypotheses by comparing average effects across the sample but ignored that effects may vary across individuals depending on existing intrinsic factors such as shyness

Summary

Introduction

Recent years have seen a substantial growth in the applicability of social robots in educational learning environments with young learners. Current research suggests that children accept social robots as trustworthy social actors from whom they can obtain reliable information (Breazeal et al, 2016; Vollmer et al, 2018; Oranç and Küntay, 2020) Whereas these findings consider the demonstrated behavior displayed by children on average, individual differences. Shyness has a substantial impact on children’s performance in educational settings, insofar as shy children can either struggle to demonstrate their abilities in such situations or implicitly reduce their learning opportunities because they avoid social interaction (Evans, 2001; Spere et al, 2004; Smith Watts et al, 2014). We aim to understand how the behavior of shy children might develop over a long-term interaction and influence learning gains with a social robot

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion