Under the advisement of Brian Scassellati, Elizabeth (Eli) Kim successfully defended her dissertation on Wednesday, August 21, 2013. Eli’s dissertation, entitled “Robots for social skills therapy in autism: evidence, systems, and designs toward clinical utility,” presented evidence toward the clinical utility of interaction with robots for communication and social skills therapies for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
Eli will continue her work at the Technology and Innovation Laboratory (TIL). The TIL is dedicated to using, advancing, and developing everyday technologies for improving the lives of individuals with developmental disabilities. As part of the Yale Child Study Center and the Yale Autism Program, their work focuses on both theoretical and applied advances that will help disconnected individuals to connect with others. The TIL mission is to bring radical, state-of-the-art, transformative technologies into everyday use in order to improve diagnostic precision, advance novel therapies, and to better understand mechanisms of change throughout the lifespan of an individual.