TUESDAY, Jan. 6, 2026 (HealthDay News) -- Social robots are efficacious and effective for children with autism, according to a study published online Dec. 24 in Science Robotics.
Daniel David, Ph.D., from Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, and colleagues presented two randomized clinical trials with different robot-assisted therapy implementations aimed at young children with autism to examine the efficacy and effectiveness of social robots. The efficacy trial included 69 children with a mean age of 4.4 years, while the second trial examining effectiveness in the real-world setting included 63 children with a mean age of 5.9 years.
The researchers found that 12 biweekly sessions of in-clinic robot-assisted therapy achieved equivalent outcomes to conventional treatment in the efficacy trial, with a significant increase in patient engagement. In the second trial, which substituted the clinical setup with a simpler one for use in schools or homes, equivalent outcomes to standard treatment were seen over the course of five sessions.
"Overall, the results contribute to an understanding of the relevance of technological solutions in treating children with ASD [autism spectrum disorder] and reducing the human workload that traditional therapies impose," the authors write.