The situated Design Rationale: of a social robot for child's disease self-management

Abstract

A young boy with type 1 Diabetes Mellitus is supported by a social robot on the road to self-management. The robot has knowledge on the goals that the boy needs to reach, as discussed with his health care professional. The robot also knows the boy’s activity options and preferences. It suggests activities based on this knowledge, but also encourages the boy to try new approaches. For parents, such a social robot means that they can be less teacher and more parent and for the health care professionals it means they can focus on the emotional aspects instead of the knowledge aspects during visits. Finally, the boy sees the robot as something that is fun and a peer in contrast to someone/something with a higher authority. The robot supports relatedness and a feeling of competence, the different activities provide a feeling of autonomy, and less budding of the parents reduces stress for the whole family. This all supports that the boy sees diabetesas his own responsibility and feels that he has enough competence and autonomy to take care of diabetes himself. In support of this vision we look in this thesis at the design and evaluation of a social robot.