Design and Architecture of a Robot-Child Speech-Controlled Game

Abstract

We describe the conceptual design, architecture, and implementation of a multimodal, robot-child dialogue system in a fast-paced, speech-controlled collaborative game. In Mole Madness, two players (a user and an anthropomorphic robot) work together to move an animated mole character through its environment via speech commands. Using a combination of speech recognition systems and a microphone array, the system can accommodate children's natural behavior in real time. We also briefly present the details of a recent data collection with children, ages 5 to 9, and some of the challenging behaviors the system elicited that we intend to explore.