Toy robot may help children with autism
-
Megan Naughton of Ross holds her son, Duncan, 3, as he interacts with Popchilla, a robot at the Autism Center of Pittsburgh in McCandless. The robot is used to help children with autism with limited or no verbal skills. -
Popchilla, a robot at the Autism Centers of Pittsburgh in Mccandless, is used to test the ability of children with autism with limited or no verbal skills.
Share with others:
He's a Carolina blue color with big floppy rabbit ears, and when the furry creature is happy, those ears go straight up. When he's mad, his green eyes turn a devilish red. Equipped with a movable mouth and paws, he also can express such emotions as sad, confused, surprised and embarrassed.
He can even speak -- either via prerecorded messages and songs or through the voice of a trained therapist using a remote microphone run through the robot's "voice box." And if all goes according to plan, the children with autism who will play with him will speak back, even if it's only by pushing the proper button on an iPad app to identify what the robot is feeling.
Meet Popchilla, the working name for a toy robot that autism experts and his creators hope will enable the children with autism to recognize emotions -- in the robot and themselves.
AutismLink, the Autism Center of Pittsburgh and Interbots are working together on the Spark grant-supported project that will involve 30 children from the greater Pittsburgh area for 10 weeks this fall.
"The idea is the kids are more interested in interacting with a robot than with a human," said Seema Patel, CEO and co-founder of Interbots, the spinoff company from the Carnegie Mellon University Entertainment Technology Center that created Popchilla.
"Kids with autism have difficulty recognizing emotions ... in others or themselves. They get mad because they don't know what they're feeling," said Cindy Waeltermann, founder and director of the Autism Center of Pittsburgh.
"Popchilla is there to facilitate communication, and for some kids any communication is good communication," Ms. Waeltermann added. The hope is that someday those communication skills will be generalized into daily life.
First Published September 22, 2010 12:00 am
