Josje Verhagen

About

Josje Verhagen is a pioneering researcher at the intersection of developmental psycholinguistics and human-robot interaction, whose work has fundamentally shaped the emerging field of robot-assisted language learning (RALL). Her research focuses on how social robots can serve as effective tutors for second language acquisition in young children, particularly in multilingual educational contexts. Verhagen’s most influential contribution is her comprehensive review on social robots for language learning (356 citations), which established the theoretical and empirical foundations for the field. She led the landmark L2TOR project, conducting one of the largest-scale studies of robot-assisted second language tutoring (137 citations), demonstrating that social robots can effectively teach English vocabulary to Dutch kindergarteners over multiple sessions. Her work uniquely explores how children’s anthropomorphic beliefs about robots affect learning outcomes (51 citations), and how robots can leverage children’s first language (e.g., Turkish) to support Dutch vocabulary acquisition (26 citations). Verhagen has also developed practical guidelines for designing social robots as second language tutors (160 citations), making her research directly applicable to educational technology. Her findings on individual differences in children’s learning skills and the role of non-verbal cues have profound implications for personalized, robot-mediated education.

Research Focus

Key Achievements

Top Papers

1. 1
   Social Robots for Language Learning: A Review

   356 citations · 2018
2. 2
   Guidelines for Designing Social Robots as Second Language Tutors

   160 citations · 2018
3. 3
   Second Language Tutoring Using Social Robots: A Large-Scale Study

   137 citations · 2019
4. 4
   A toy or a friend? Children's anthropomorphic beliefs about robots and how these relate to second‐language word learning

   51 citations · 2020
5. 5
   Teaching <scp>Turkish‐Dutch</scp> kindergartners Dutch vocabulary with a social robot: Does the robot's use of Turkish translations benefit children's Dutch vocabulary learning?

   26 citations · 2020
6. 6
   Individual Differences in Children’s (Language) Learning Skills Moderate Effects of Robot-Assisted Second Language Learning

   14 citations · 2021
7. 7
   Investigating the Effects of a Robot Peer on L2 Word Learning

   14 citations · 2018
8. 8
   Children’s reliance on the non-verbal cues of a robot versus a human

   8 citations · 2019
9. 9
   Designing and Evaluating Iconic Gestures for Child-Robot Second Language Learning

   7 citations · 2021
10. 10
    Second Language Tutoring Using Social Robots: L2TOR - The Movie

    5 citations · 2019

Key Collaborators

Contact & Links