Seriously, this is sad, and feels so cold. As others have mentioned we have service dogs in hospitals to visit kids. And also as others have mentioned, the hospital that piloted this is funded partially by the toy company Mattel, so I question the bias in this study.
Do you believe that this problem is already solved and not worth the researcher's time? If so, that reflects negatively only on you and I am glad others are striving to do even better.
Of course such studies should be reviewed and critiqued, but it is intellectually lazy to point only to the source of funding without further consideration.
Also a reply on hacker news is not the place for me to go into a complete peer review of this research. I am merely pointing out that they are promoting essentially a toy and the hospital is funded mainly by a toy company.
Also, no, I don't think that this research is necessarily a waste, but I would caution people from thinking this solves anything meaningful, and also would caution people from using this technology in lieu of real human interaction.
It is a novelty, a fun toy. My cynicism comes from seeing people trying to automate human interaction in seemingly every facet of life. My point is not everything has a technical solution, and beyond a small research project I could see larger scale versions of this being detrimental to patients since it will be used in lieu of other non-technical solutions.
These researchers spent seven months interacting child patients, some of whom were likely terminally ill, in an effort to make one of the hardest experiences of their lives a little less difficult. They would spend an hour interacting with and playing with the children via the robot. 90% of parents found the experience positive enough to request another visit.
There is plenty of room for valid critique here. Perhaps the kids would have preferred an Xbox. Perhaps the novelty will wear off quickly.
There is less room for critiques like "this feels sad and cold" or knee-jerk reactions about techies trying to solve everything with technology. If you had paused and asked yourself "Who even ran this study?" you would have noticed that the lead author is not even a techie but a doctor! Presumably they have some exposure to the problems these children face.
I was frustrated by your comment because you have allowed a misplaced cynical view to halt any curiosity you might have had about this study. Your cynicism allowed you to immediately dismiss it.
My comment was deliberately harsh. I think you should re-read your comment and imagine how Dr. Gabriel Oland or other members of the team might perceive it.
I stand by my original comment though. I really don't think the team should take my feedback as a personal insult, it is simply my own personal view on it, not a formal critique.
I read the research because I was genuinely curious, and I still think it feels like it falls in line with the old adage "when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail". The fact that the lead researcher was a doctor doesn't change that for me.
I dislike a lot of projects like this because I have had experiences in my industry where people want to optimize and automate everything. Perhaps this will work, but in my experience things like this fall flat; I am always opened to being surprised though, and I certainly will not be upset if this does end up helping people and my read on it was wrong.