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How do you play with a robotic toy animal?: a long-term study of Pleo

Published: 09 June 2010 Publication History

Abstract

Pleo is one of the more advanced interactive toys currently available for the home market, taking the form of a robotic dinosaur. We present an exploratory study of how it was interacted with and reflected upon in the homes of six families during 2 to 10 months. Our analysis emphasizes a discrepancy between the participants' initial desires to borrow a Pleo and what they reported later on about their actual experiences. Further, the data suggests an apparent tension between participants expecting the robot to work as a 'toy' while making consistent comparisons with real pet animals. We end by discussing a series of implications for design of this category of toys, in order to better maintain interest and engagement over time.

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cover image ACM Other conferences
IDC '10: Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Interaction Design and Children
June 2010
389 pages
ISBN:9781605589510
DOI:10.1145/1810543
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Published: 09 June 2010

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Author Tags

  1. Pleo
  2. children
  3. home
  4. long-term
  5. robot
  6. robotic toys

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  • (2024)Understanding Family Needs: Informing Social Robot Design to Support Children with Disabilities to Engage in PlayProceedings of the 12th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction10.1145/3687272.3688301(71-80)Online publication date: 24-Nov-2024
  • (2024)Towards an Integrative Framework for Robot Personality ResearchACM Transactions on Human-Robot Interaction10.1145/364001013:1(1-22)Online publication date: 10-Jan-2024
  • (2024)Children's Acceptance of a Domestic Social Robot: How It Evolves over TimeACM Transactions on Human-Robot Interaction10.1145/363806613:2(1-20)Online publication date: 14-Jun-2024
  • (2024)Robots in Family Routines: Development of and Initial Insights from the Family-Robot Routines Inventory2024 33rd IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (ROMAN)10.1109/RO-MAN60168.2024.10731432(1070-1077)Online publication date: 26-Aug-2024
  • (2024) Human, Animal, or Machine? A Design-Based Exploration of Social Robot Embodiment with a Creative Toolkit * 2024 33rd IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (ROMAN)10.1109/RO-MAN60168.2024.10731416(1331-1338)Online publication date: 26-Aug-2024
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  • (2024)Evaluating privacy, security, and trust perceptions in conversational AI: A systematic reviewComputers in Human Behavior10.1016/j.chb.2024.108344159(108344)Online publication date: Oct-2024
  • (2024)How Does Children’s Anthropomorphism of a Social Robot Develop Over Time? A Six-Wave Panel StudyInternational Journal of Social Robotics10.1007/s12369-024-01155-916:7(1665-1679)Online publication date: 18-Jun-2024
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