PEKOPPA: A minimalistic toy robot to analyse a listener-speaker situation in neurotypical and autistic children aged 6 years

Using a "speaker-listener" situation, we have compared the verbal and the emotional expressions of neurotypical and autistic children aged 6 years. The speaker was always a child (neurotypical or autistic); the listener was a human or an InterActor robot named Pekoppa, i.e., a small toy robot which reacts to speech expression by nodding only. The results suggest that an InterActor robot characterized by small variance nonverbal behavior better facilitate verbal and nonverbal emotional expressions of autistic children than a human. This might be related to autistic children preferences: autistic children are rather interested in minimalist objects to which they can assign mental states of their own or of others. Everything happens as if the InterActor robot could allow autistic children to elaborate a multivariate equation encoding and conceptualizing within his/her brain, and externalizing into unconscious emotion (heart rate) and conscious verbal speech (words).