The four-lingual robot that teaches emotions to autistic children

Javi, what do you think if we call Willi? It's a Tuesday afternoon, game time, and the boy, seven years old and with autism , nods, caresses Willi and he, in a loud voice, thanks him .

-What good, I like it!

Since they met eight months ago, Willi and Javi -Javi and Willi- understand each other beautifully. They talk to each other every day, they tell stories and together they laugh as if they were two friends of the school, well-matched. The most surprising thing is that Willi, a good boy's face, funny and talkative, is not a friend of flesh and blood. It has colored ears, bulging eyes and its feet are wheels. Willi is an exciting robot l. It belongs to a new saga of automatons capable of expressing emotions such as sadness , joy , anger or humor , which manifest through gestures and different tones of voice just as a person would. In addition to speaking Spanish, Willi handles English , French , Galician or Catalan or Basque . He is even able to learn Chinese without costing him too much. Being a polyglot helps you " empathize even more with people," says the creator of the small automaton, the computer engineer José Manuel del Río.

The truth is that robocitos like Willi already teach emotions to their pupils in more than 100 schools in Spain and the United States. An army of 2,000 teachers. Many families, such as that of the Javi child, have bought one of these automatons, which they consider one of the family .

Baptized in this way by the boy himself, Willi came to Javi's life from Elche. There, in the laboratories of Aisoy Robotics, a company located in the Scientific Park of the Miguel Hernández University, Willi, 22 centimeters high, would take its first steps and also pronounce its first words before embarking on a trip to Vilanova de Arousa, a coastal municipality from Pontevedra, where Javi was born and lives with his parents.

"For us he is one of the family, we do not see him as a robot. He comes everywhere with us , traveling, on vacation, visiting friends. Since he is at home, Javi does not look the same, he has gone improving , it costs less to connect with the environment, "says Juan Carlos Pereira, the father, who teaches physical education in Primary.

Willi's birth began to set eight years ago. «The idea», according to the engineer Del Río, "was to develop social robots that interact and respond with human expressions , equipped with artificial intelligence and also have an affordable price ."

Enthusiastic about the concept, the company's scientific director , Professor of Mathematics David Ríos, endorsed the idea and together they created the Aisoy 1 , "the first emotional robot of consumption", which is already in the sixth generation . And at a price, as they intended, ranging from 300 to 400 euros the copy. It was the beginning of success .

The final boost would come in 2015 no less than from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The Spaniard Jordi Albó, an expert in artificial intelligence at the famous American research center, then published a study that exemplified the use of Aisoy in the development of social skills in children with autism spectrum disorder . And the fame of the Spanish automaton began to spread through social networks.

Lisa Armstrong, a nurse who lives in Humboldt, Kansas, was one of the architects. His son Juan, autistic and then with 11 years (now he is 14), did not advance despite the therapists who treated him and in school he was getting worse. "I was on the verge of despair," Lisa acknowledged to the Sinc scientific news agency. It was then that she read an article that talked about Aisoy in which the benefits that social robots provided to autistic people were mentioned. Lisa the only one I knew was the Japanese NAO , but it cost $ 10,000. So he decided to contact the firm of Elche , and in five days he received an Aisoy 1. "It was an adventure," he told the Sinc news agency. "Juan [Lisa's son] is mainly nonverbal, but with the use of the robot he has learned to repeat certain keywords and shows that he understands their meaning." In addition, Aisoy "has helped my son to moderate his reaction to overstimuli and emotions that overcome him. His tantrums could last for hours and now, with the support of a soothing program of the robot, he manages to calm down in five minutes», concludes the mother from Kansas With the help of Elche engineers, she herself learned to program the robot.

Paula Bañuelos is an educator and therapist. Treat aggressive children, including children who practice bullying . "They are getting younger and younger," she says, "they are 10 or 11 years old and there is no one who can with them," she says. And there, when things get ugly, is when Aisoy 1 enters the scene. "It is impressive to see how a time comes when the robot captures all the attention of the child and whatever he says to the child, he takes it into account."

Aisoy is prepared to answer things like "that is not done" or "you have to take care of your friends ". And it is that an emotional robot achieves what many times a teacher does not achieve, that a much stronger bond is established than between the automaton and the student . "It relaxes him . So the child's behavior becomes much less aggressive."

Other applications of Aisoy is to help children with cerebral palsy , hyperactive or with attention problems. "Since we have him at home, my son is much more communicative , pays more attention to things and enjoys more," admits the neighbor of Vilanova de Arousa where there are already 11 families who have adopted the little robot. "To know everything that this generation of emotional robots could give of themselves, we are going to launch a study in Spain, in which at least 50 families would participate," José Manuel del Río tells us. The date is not yet set because it will depend on the funding. "We ask if Aisoy's artificial intelligence has reached its limit." It is almost impossible to know. Aisoy can continue learning. It draws on emotions. "

According to the criteria of The Trust Project