Abstract
Emerging technologies such as social robotics and virtual reality have found a wide application in the field of education and tutoring particularly for children with special needs. Taban is a novel social robot that has been designed and programmed specifically for educational interaction with dyslexic children, who have various problems in reading despite their normal intelligence. In this paper, the acceptability and eligibility of a virtual reality serious game with the presence of the Taban social robot avatar was studied among nineteen children six of whom were dyslexic. In this game, children perform attractive practical exercises while interacting with the Taban avatar in a virtual environment to strengthen their reading skills; then the game automatically evaluates their performance and the avatar gives them appropriate feedback. The sense of immersion in the 3D virtual space and the presence of the Taban robot avatar motivates the children to do the assignments. The results of the psychological assessment using the SAM questionnaire are promising and illustrate that the game was highly accepted by both groups of children. Moreover, according to statistical analysis, the performance of children with dyslexia in the exercises was significantly weaker than their typically developing peers. Thus, this V2R lexicon game has the potential for screening dyslexia.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Lyon, G.R., Shaywitz, S.E., Shaywitz, B.A.: A definition of dyslexia. Ann. Dyslexia 53(1), 1–14 (2003)
Peterson, R.L., Pennington, B.F.: Developmental Dyslexia. Annu. Rev. Clin. Psychol. 11(1), 283–307 (2015)
Wagner, R.K., et al.: The prevalence of dyslexia: a new approach to its estimation. J. Learn. Disabil. 53(5), 354–365 (2020)
Yavari, A., Valizadeh, A., Marofizadeh, S., Panahian, M.: Prevalence dyslexia among first to sixth grade Persian speaking students in Arak, Iran. Function Disability J. 2(1), 100–104 (2019)
Pouretemad, H.R., Khatibi, A., Zarei, M., Stein, J.: Manifestations of developmental dyslexia in monolingual Persian speaking students. Arch. Iran. Med. 14(4), 259–265 (2011)
Hakim, A., Ghorbanibirgani, A.: Prevalence of dyslexia among male students in primary schools and its relationship with obesity and being overweight in Ahvaz, Iran. Inter. J. Community Based Nursing Midwifery 3(2), 116 (2015)
Nordström, T., Nilsson, S., Gustafson, S., Svensson, I.: Assistive technology applications for students with reading difficulties: special education teachers’ experiences and perceptions. Disabil. Rehabil. Assist. Technol.. 14(8), 798–808 (2019)
Habib, M., Giraud, K.: Dyslexia. Handb. Clin. Neurol.. Clin. Neurol. 111, 229–235 (2013)
Nurul Anis, M.Y., Normah, C.D., Mahadir, A., Norhayati, I., Rogayah, A.R., Dzalani, H.: Interventions for children with dyslexia: a review on current intervention methods. Med. J. Malaysia 73(5), 311–320 (2018)
National Research Council: Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children. National Academies Press, Washington, D.C. (1998)
van der Leij, A.: Dyslexia and early intervention: what did we learn from the Dutch Dyslexia Programme? Dyslexia 19(4), 241–255 (2013)
Torgesen, J.K.: Recent discoveries on remedial interventions for children with Dyslexia. In: The Science of Reading: A Handbook, pp. 521–537. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. (2005)
Pedroli, E., Padula, P., Guala, A., Meardi, M.T., Riva, G., Albani, G.: A psychometric tool for a virtual reality rehabilitation approach for Dyslexia. Comput. Math. Methods Med. 2017, 7048676 (2017)
Broadhead, M., Daylamani-Zad, D., Mackinnon, L., Bacon, L.: A multisensory 3D environment as intervention to aid reading in Dyslexia: a proposed framework. In: 2018 10th International Conference on Virtual Worlds and Games for Serious Applications (VS-Games), pp. 1–4 (2018)
Fokides, E., Chronopoulou, M.-I., Kaimara, P.: Comparing videos and a 3D virtual environment for teaching school-related functional skills and behaviors to students with ADHD or developmental dyslexia, displaying challenging behaviors: a case study. Res. Pract. Technol. Enhanc. Learn. 14(1), 22 (2019)
Peters, J.L., De Losa, L., Bavin, E.L., Crewther, S.G.: Efficacy of dynamic visuo-attentional interventions for reading in dyslexic and neurotypical children: a systematic review. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 100, 58–76 (2019)
Peters, J.L., Crewther, S.G., Murphy, M.J., Bavin, E.L.: Action video game training improves text reading accuracy, rate and comprehension in children with dyslexia: a randomized controlled trial. Sci. Rep. 11(1), 18584 (2021)
Taheri, A., Shariati, A., Heidari, R., Shahab, M., Alemi, M., Meghdari, A.: Impacts of using a social robot to teach music to children with low-functioning autism. Paladyn, J. Behav. Robot. 12(1), 256–275 (2021)
Ghorbandaei Pour, A., Taheri, A., Alemi, M., Meghdari, A.: Human–robot facial expression reciprocal interaction platform: case studies on children with autism. Inter. J. Soc. Robot. 10, 179–198 (2018)
Belpaeme, T., Kennedy, J., Ramachandran, A., Scassellati, B., Tanaka, F.: Social robots for education: a review. Sci Robot. 3(21) eaat5954 (2018)
Mokhtari, M., Shariati, A., Meghdari, A.: Taban: a retro-projected social robotic - head for human-robot interaction. In: 2019 7th International Conference on Robotics and Mechatronics (ICRoM), pp. 46–51 (2019)
Shahab, M., et al.: Utilizing social virtual reality robot (V2R) for music education to children with high-functioning autism. Educ. Inform. Technol., 1–25 (2022)
Shahab, M., Raisi, M., Hejrati, M., Taheri, A., Meghdari, A.: Virtual reality robot for rehabilitation of children with cerebral palsy (CP). In: 2019 7th International Conference on Robotics and Mechatronics (ICRoM), pp. 63–68. IEEE (2019)
Shahab, M., et al.: Social Virtual reality robot (V2R): a novel concept for education and rehabilitation of children with autism. In: 2017 5th RSI international conference on robotics and mechatronics (ICRoM), pp. 82–87. IEEE (2017)
Maskati, E., Alkeraiem, F., Khalil, N., Baik, R., Aljuhani, R., Alsobhi, A.: Using virtual reality (VR) in teaching students with Dyslexia. Inter. J. Emerging Technol. Learn. (iJET) 16(09), Art. no. 09 (2021)
Maresca, G., et al.: Use of virtual reality in children with Dyslexia. Children (Basel) 9(11), 1621 (2022)
Pérez Quichimbo, S.M., Barrera Quimbita, E.D., Navas Moya, M.P., López Chico, X.: Edufarmy: a multisensory educational software system that improves the learning of children with dyslexia using the orton-gillingham approach. In: Zambrano Vizuete, M., Botto-Tobar, M., Diaz Cadena, A., Durakovic, B. (eds.) CI3 2021. LNCSs, vol 511. Springer, Cham (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-11438-0_36
Guillen-Sanz, H., Rodríguez-Garcia, B., Martinez, K., Manzanares, M.C.S.: A virtual reality serious game for children with Dyslexia: DixGame. In: De Paolis, L.T., Arpaia, P., Sacco, M. (eds.) Extended Reality. XR Salento 2022. LNCS, vol 13446. Springer, Cham (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-15553-6_3
Yeguas-Bolívar, E., Alcalde-Llergo, J.M., Aparicio-Martínez, P., Taborri, J., Zingoni, A., Pinzi, S.: Determining the difficulties of students with dyslexia via virtual reality and artificial intelligence: an exploratory analysis. In: 2022 IEEE International Conference on Metrology for Extended Reality, Artificial Intelligence and Neural Engineering (MetroXRAINE), pp. 585–590 (2022)
Zingoni, A., et al.: Investigating issues and needs of dyslexic students at university: proof of concept of an artificial intelligence and virtual reality-based supporting platform and preliminary results. Appli. Sci. 11(10), Art. no. 10 (2021)
Vellutino, F.R., Fletcher, J.M., Snowling, M.J., Scanlon, D.M.: Specific reading disability (dyslexia): what have we learned in the past four decades? J. Child Psychol. Psychiatry 45(1), 2–40 (2004)
Ramus, F., et al.: Theories of developmental dyslexia: insights from a multiple case study of dyslexic adults. Brain 126(Pt 4), 841–865 (2003)
Anthony, J.L., Francis, D.J.: Development of phonological awareness. Curr. Dir. Psychol. Sci. 14(5), 255–259 (2005)
Soleimani, Z.: Phonological awareness and effect of reading in 5.5 and 6.5 years old Persian children. Archives of Rehabilitation 1(2), 27–35 (2000)
Bradley, M.M., Lang, P.J.: Measuring emotion: the self-assessment manikin and the semantic differential. J. Behav. Ther. Exp. Psych. 25(1), 49–59 (1994)
Acknowledgment
This study was funded by the “Dr. Ali Akbar Siassi Memorial Research Grant Award” and Sharif University of Technology (Grant No. G980517). We would like to thank our friends Ms. Shabnam Tahbaz for recording the robot voices and Ms. Shakiba Ahmadi for her collaboration and aid during the acceptance sessions.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding authors
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2024 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this paper
Cite this paper
Amiri, O. et al. (2024). Virtual Reality Serious Game with the TABAN Robot Avatar for Educational Rehabilitation of Dyslexic Children. In: Ali, A.A., et al. Social Robotics. ICSR 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 14453 . Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-8715-3_14
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-8715-3_14
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-99-8714-6
Online ISBN: 978-981-99-8715-3
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)