The Devil and Tom Robot: Using robotics to improve students’ empathy in a STEAM-integrated classroom

Robotics have increasingly been used to advance students’ higher-order thinking skills in STEM education. Yet robotics-based interventions that merely focus on programming risk overlooking students’ empathy, which is a critical competence for driving socio-technical innovation and navigating STEM careers. To address this gap, this action research study implemented a robotics-based intervention in a high school STEAM-integrated course and evaluated its effect on students’ empathy. A convergent mixed methods design was applied. Data was collected from three sources, including Interpersonal Reactivity Index administered before and after attending the intervention, field notes and semi-structured interviews at the close of the intervention. The results showed the benefits of the robotics-based intervention for improving student overall empathy levels, particularly in the domain of fantasy. Overall, the findings of this study shed light on design considerations for robotics-based interventions in STEAM-integrated classrooms, ensuring that STEM remains central while also fostering students’ human-centered capabilities.