Zhang Lian, Amat Ashwaq Z, Zhao Huan, Swanson Amy, Weitlauf Amy, Warren Zachary, Sarkar Nilanjan
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and Robotics and Autonomous Systems Laboratory, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, Treatment and Research Institute for Autism Spectrum Disorders, Nashville, TN, USA.
IEEE Trans Learn Technol. 2021 Jun;14(3):338-352. doi: 10.1109/tlt.2020.3029223. Epub 2020 Oct 6.
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by core deficits in social interaction and communication. Collaborative puzzle games are interactive activities that can be played to foster the collaboration and verbal-communication skills of children with ASD. In this paper, we have designed an intelligent agent that can play collaborative puzzle games with children and verbally communicate with them as if it is another human player. Furthermore, this intelligent agent is also able to automatically measure children's task-performance and verbal-communication behaviors throughout game play. Two preliminary studies were conducted with children with ASD to evaluate the feasibility and performance of the intelligent agent. Results of Study I demonstrated the intelligent agent's ability to play games and communicate with children within the game-playing domain. Results of Study II indicated its potential to measure the communication and collaboration skills of human users.
自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）是一种神经发育障碍，其特征在于社交互动和沟通方面的核心缺陷。协作拼图游戏是一种互动活动，可以通过玩这种游戏来培养患有ASD的儿童的协作和语言沟通能力。在本文中，我们设计了一个智能代理，它可以与儿童玩协作拼图游戏，并像另一个人类玩家一样与他们进行语言交流。此外，这个智能代理还能够在整个游戏过程中自动测量儿童的任务表现和语言交流行为。我们对患有ASD的儿童进行了两项初步研究，以评估该智能代理的可行性和性能。研究一的结果证明了该智能代理在游戏领域内与儿童玩游戏和交流的能力。研究二的结果表明了其测量人类用户沟通和协作技能的潜力。
