協助孩童學習與表達之機器人Yabee

機器人的應用在近年來已慢慢從工廠走入生活，也漸漸被應用在兒童教學與醫療中。本研究以兒童為目標，協助教學與幫助醫療為目的，建構一以語音及視覺作為主要交流媒介的互動式說故事機器人平台。希望針對一般兒童，能夠達到教學與陪伴需求；而另外針對自閉兒，則希望幫助他們在與機器人的相處過程中增進社交技巧，且透過語音互動交流，得以了解自閉兒的內心想法，因為根據研究顯示，自閉兒雖然具有社交障礙，然大部分卻能夠與機器人自然相處。考量以上需求，本研究所開發之機器人在語音上具備即時錄放功能，為一最基礎之語音互動功能，藉由對機器人進行語言教學為由激發孩子們表達；演繹故事功能，可自行錄製故事與搭配動作，由機器人詮釋整個故事，此功能同時亦可進行學術內容的錄製，以達教學效果；輸入文字生成語音功能，如此一來則只需藉由打字輸入故事內容而不需語音錄製；基本語音辨識功能，使用梅爾倒頻譜係數演算法與動態時間校正達成辨識，能夠協助孩童矯正發音。而在視覺部分，則包含即時觀測與錄製、模仿，及使用CamShift演算法達到物件追蹤功能。平台外型以兔子為基本型態，絨毛布料作為表面材質，讓孩童在互動過程中可藉觸摸產生依賴感與親切感。在外觀上捨棄建立含有自由度或以LED的臉部表情，轉而將自由度建構在肢體上並機器人身上多處建有LED燈，藉由肢體語言與簡單顏色指示表達情緒。而由於兔子在孩童的想法中，是一種會「跳」的動物，因此特意為此機器人平台設計了跳躍的功能，而為了能使機器人平台能夠自在行走，本機器人以全向輪機構作為底盤，使其在平面上得以自由移動及旋轉。在與兒童的互動實驗中，發現透過本機器人，可以增加孩童學習意願；而自閉兒亦能自在地與本機器人相處，達到眼神交流與觸摸行為，這些是自閉兒在與正常人交流時較欠缺的社交技巧。未來亦可望藉由本機器人平台協助更多兒童。

關鍵字

互動機器人；說故事機器人；語言學習；語音辨識；視覺搜尋；自閉兒

並列摘要

Recently the robots have started to blend into human’s daily life, and they have gradually been used in children’s education and medication. According to recent researches, though autistic children often have impaired social interaction, they can somehow behave normally with robot companions. In this thesis an interactive robot, Yabee, using verbal language and visual effect as main interactive medium is developed, and the aim of this robot is to help autistic children gain the social competence through playing with it, and also from the process of verbal communication we may understand more about the inner world of autistic children. Aside from autistic children, Yabee can also serve as a friend to typical kids and provide tutorial or companioning purpose. The appearance of Yabee is based on rabbit, and with the fluffy surface children can fondle it to bring friendliness and feeling of dependency. Yabee has 11 DOFs for interaction, which on its limbs, ears, head and body, and LED is mounted in multiple parts on the body and Yabee can express its emotions by patterns of limb motion and different colors of LED. Since rabbit can jump is a general thoughts, Yabee also is designed to have the ability to jump; the omni wheel structure let Yabee can move and rotate freely on the surface. It has been observed in the experiments that children interacted with Yabee gained interests to learn and promoted learning outcome. Besides, autistic children generally have difficulties having eye contact and touching when interacting with people, but these hindrance do not present during communication with Yabee. In the future Yabee is expected to help more children and serve an important role in autism interaction.