Goes to the Heart: Speaking the User's Native Language

We are developing a social robot to work alongside human support workers who help new arrivals in a country to navigate the necessary bureaucratic processes in that country. The ultimate goal is to develop a robot that can support refugees and asylum seekers in the UK. As a first step, we are targeting a less vulnerable population with similar support needs: international students in the University of Glasgow. As the target users are in a new country and may be in a state of stress when they seek support, forcing them to communicate in a foreign language will only fuel their anxiety, so a crucial aspect of the robot design is that it should speak the users' native language if at all possible. We provide a technical description of the robot hardware and software, and describe the user study that will shortly be carried out. At the end, we explain how we are engaging with refugee support organisations to extend the robot into one that can also support refugees and asylum seekers.
QC 20240402Part of ISBN 9798400703232