Evaluating robot facial expressions.

This paper outlines a demonstration of the work carried out in the SoCoRo project investigating how far a neuro-typical population recognises facial expressions on a non-naturalistic robot face that are designed to show approval and disapproval. RFID-tagged objects are presented to an Emys robot head (called Alyx) and Alyx reacts to each with a facial expression. Participants are asked to put the object in a box marked 'Like' or 'Dislike'. This study is being extended to include assessment of participants' Autism Quotient using a validated questionnaire as a step towards using a robot to help train high-functioning adults with an Autism Spectrum Disorder in social signal recognition.