Socially Assistive Robot in Sexual Health: Group and Individual Student-Robot Interaction Activities Promoting Disclosure, Learning and Positive Attitudes

Abstract Comprehensive sex education (SE) in schools plays a vital role in establishing a profound link to and actively advocating for sexual health, aiming at educating children about sexual health, ethics, and behaviour. The implementation of SE in elementary schools can significantly transform students’ attitudes and comprehension of sexual knowledge. However, teaching SE has been challenging at times due to students’ beliefs, attitudes, and occasional shyness or emotional reservations. Socially assistive robots (SARs) sometimes are perceived as more trustworthy than humans, based on research showing that they are not anticipated as judgmental. Inspired by those evidences, this study aims to assess the success of a SAR as a facilitator for SE lessons for elementary school students. We conducted two experiments, (a) a group activity in the school classroom where the Nao robot gave a SE lecture, and we evaluated how much information the students acquired from the lecture, and (b) an individual activity where the students interacted 1:1 with the robot, and we evaluated their attitudes towards the subject of SE, and if they felt comfortable to ask SE related questions to the robot. Data based on given pre- and post-questionnaires and video annotations demonstrated that the SAR statistically significantly improved students’ attitudes towards SE. Moreover, they addressed to the robot questions regarding SE and body parts. The study also highlights the SAR characteristics that make them efficient to support SE, such as their embodiment and non-judgmental behavior. This study is unique in its focus on emphasizing the SAR’s potential to support SE for elementary school students in a real class environment.