How culture and presence of a robot affect teachers' use of touch with autistic children

Abstract

We quantitatively analyze and compare how teachers in Serbia and the UK use physical contact to guide autistic children through an activity with and without a robot. We annotated 40 videos from the DE-ENIGMA dataset of autistic children interacting with or without a robot in the presence of an adult teacher in Serbia or the UK. Results show touch was widely used in both countries and more when the robot was not present. Culture affected where touch occurred, while the robot affected touch style.