This study aims to examine the effects of safety education using an AI humanoid robot on the safety knowledge and safety problem-solving skills of three-year-old children. To this end, the experimental group received interactive safety education facil...
This study aims to examine the effects of safety education using an AI humanoid robot on the safety knowledge and safety problem-solving skills of three-year-old children. To this end, the experimental group received interactive safety education facilitated by an AI humanoid robot, while the comparison group received traditional safety education using the same content delivered through conventional audiovisual and pictorial materials.
The research questions established for this study are as follows:
1. What is the effect of safety education using an AI humanoid robot on the safety knowledge of three-year-old children?
2. What is the effect of safety education using an AI humanoid robot on the safety problem-solving ability of three-year-old children?
The participants were 29 three-year-old children attending two childcare centers located in City A and City S (15 in the experimental group and 14 in the comparison group). The study was conducted over 14 sessions from June 16 to August 22, 2024. The experimental group engaged in activities using the Safety Education Play Support Materials (Child Safety Agency, 2022) implemented through an AI humanoid robot, whereas the comparison group received the same content using the original materials in the standard instructional format. Both groups completed pre- and post-assessments.
For measurement, the safety knowledge test was based on Pickle’s (1989) Safety Education Program, adapted by Kwak (2000) and later revised by Chae (2016). Safety problem-solving skills were assessed using a tool originally developed by Kwak (2000), revised by Park (2011) and Ko (2016), and reorganized by Kim (2018). Data were analyzed using SPSS 29.0 with descriptive statistics and independent-samples t-tests.
The results revealed the following. First, the experimental group that received AI humanoid robot-based safety education showed statistically significant improvements in overall safety knowledge and in the subdomains of traffic safety, disaster preparedness, prevention of sexual violence and child abuse, and prevention of drug misuse and abuse. No significant differences were found between the groups in the domains of missing/abduction prevention and daily-life safety. Second, the experimental group demonstrated significantly greater improvement in safety problem-solving skills compared to the comparison group.
Overall, the AI humanoid robot functioned as an interactive instructional medium that effectively enhanced children’s engagement and participation, leading to improvements in both safety knowledge and safety problem-solving skills. These findings suggest that AI humanoid robots represent a developmentally appropriate and promising tool for safety education in early childhood settings.