Ana Paula da Silva Pereira

An approach to promote social and communication behaviors in children with autism spectrum disorders: Robot based intervention

Most autistic people present some difficulties in developing social behavior, living in their own world. This study has the goal to improve the social life of children with autism with a main focus in promoting their social interaction and communication. It is necessary to call for childrens attention and enforce their collaboration, where a robot, LEGO MindStorm, behaves as a mediator/promoter of this interaction. A set of experiments designed to share objects and fulfill simple orders, by the 11 years old autistic child at the time of daily routine work and in-game with the robot, are described. The generalization of the acquired skills by the child in new contexts and environments are also tested. Results are described showing the outcomes of the experiments.

Early intervention in Portugal: study of professionals’ perceptions

Early intervention (EI) has been characterized by considerable advances in its domain, which has had great repercussions in the implementation of the family-centered approach. These changes have had implications in the practices and in the adoption and learning of new values that should be implemented in EI. This study evaluates the professional perspectives regarding family-centered practices in EI programs in Portugal. The results highlight the importance of effective collaboration and coordination between health, education, and social services and the importance of providing child and family support in a natural context. These results reinforce the need to invest in professional training to improve the quality of services offered to families in EI.

Building a game scenario to encourage children with autism to recognize and label emotions using a humanoid robot

This paper presents an exploratory study in which children with autism interact with ZECA (Zeno Engaging Children with Autism). ZECA is a humanoid robot with a face covered with a material allowing the display of varied facial expressions. The study investigates a novel scenario for robot-assisted play, to help promoting labelling of emotions by children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). The study was performed during three sessions with two boys diagnosed with ASD. The results obtained from the analysis of the childrens behaviours while interacting with ZECA helped us improve several aspects of our game scenario such as the technical specificities of the game and its dynamics, and the experimental setup. The software produced for this study allows the robot to autonomously identify the answers of the child during the session. This automatic identification helped the fluidity of the game and freed the experimenter to participate in triadic interactions with the child. The evaluation of the game scenario that will be used in a future study was the main goal of this pilot study, rather than to quantify and evaluate the performance of the children. Overall, this exploratory study in teaching children about labelling emotions using a humanoid robot embedded in a game scenario demonstrated the possible positive outcomes this child-robot interaction can produce and highlighted the issues regarding data collection and their analysis that will inform future studies.

Happiness and Sadness Recognition System—Preliminary Results with an Intel RealSense 3D Sensor

Systems and devices that can recognize human affects have been in development for a considerable time. Facial features are usually extracted by using video data or a Microsoft Kinect sensor. The present paper proposes an emotion recognition system that uses the recent Intel RealSense 3D sensor, whose reliability and validity in the field of emotion recognition has not yet been studied. This preliminary work focus on happiness and sadness. The system extracts the user’s facial Action Units and head motion data. Then, it uses a Support Vector Machine to automatically classify the emotion expressed by the user. The results point out the adequacy of Intel RealSense for facial features extraction in emotion recognition systems as well as the importance of determining head motion when recognizing sadness.

Early Intervention in Portugal: Family Support and Benefits.

This work is financed by national funds by FCT – Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia under the project pes-OE/ CED/UI1661/2011, CIED.

Development of skills in children with ASD using a robotic platform

The interaction and communication skills are essential to live in society. However, individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have a gap in these abilities which affects their daily life. Previous studies suggest that children with ASD demonstrate some positive behaviors in presence of a robotic platform. This study intends to evaluate the effect of a robotic platform on children with ASD, checking if the platform can be a stimulating agent for childrens interaction, as well as a skill learning promoter. So, it is used the robot Lego Mindstorms NXT as a mediator/reward to encourage children with ASD to interact with others and also to learn some cognitive skills.

Robótica-Autismo project: Technology for autistic children

This article presents the Robótica-Autismo research project which started in 2009 from a partnership with APPACDM (Portuguese Association of Parents and Friends of Mentally Retarded Citizens). The main objective of the study is to promote the interaction and communication with children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) by using robots. Different approaches have been followed by the researchers enrolled in this project. Some studies are focused on using Lego robots to teach social and academic skills to children with ASD; other studies are dedicated to the detection of stereotyped movements in children with ASD using two different methods: the Kinect sensor and accelerometers. Recent work is related to the use of a humanoid robot that allows facial expressions to facilitate the emotion recognition and teaching facial expressions.

Parâmetros recomendados para a qualidade da avaliação em intervenção precoce

This article aims to do a synthesized review of theoretical and empirical principles underlying the practices currently recommended for assessment in early intervention. Describes the major paradigm shifts in Early Intervention in the last decades, and how they are reflected in assessment processes, and presents a brief description of the evidence-based characteristics of assessment in Early Intervention. It also presents some tools and assessment procedures that are consistent with the practices described within the research literature, as more responsive to the needs, concerns and priorities of children and their families.

Construção e validação de um instrumento de avaliação do perfil desenvolvimental de crianças com Perturbação do Espectro do Autismo

nos ultimos anos a investigacao tem dado particular relevância as alteracoes do Processamento Sensorial nas criancas com perturbacoes do espectro do autismo (PEA) e a literatura refere que entre 42% a 88% das criancas com PEA apresentam este tipo de disfuncao. Nesta linha foi definido um projeto de investigacao centrado na construcao de uma escala que avalie a tradicional triade que caracteriza as criancas com PEA (Interacao, Comunicacao e Comportamento e interesses repetitivos e estereotipados), enriquecida pela inclusao de um novo dominio: o Processamento Sensorial. Com a construcao e validacao desta escala pretendemos que pais e profissionais utilizem colaborativamente um instrumento de avaliacao da intervencao que lhes permita monitorizar o processo de apoio e adequar as suas praticas. Neste artigo descrevemos os procedimentos e os resultados das sucessivas fases de construcao do instrumento, desde as analises iniciais mais qualitativas ate aos estudos centrados na analise quantitativa dos itens.

Robotic Tool to Improve Skills in Children with ASD: A Preliminary Study

Children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) may present some difficulties in developing social behaviours, communicating with others and acquiring cognitive skills. In this study, we test the introduction of a robot Lego Mindstorms NXT as a mediator and/or positive reinforcement in the intervention of children with ASD in triadic interventions. The goal was to improve their academic skills and to transfer the acquired skills to their daily lives. Three case studies with 8-13 years old children are presented and discussed. The explored target skills were the concept of quantity, colour awareness and a gesture to make a request. Parents had an active participatory role in this study, especially in the Skill Transfer Phase.