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“Be PART of it!” is the PARTicipative approach, which enables children and adolescents with and without chronic illness to play a decisive role in shaping the scientific process.
For some children and adolescents it is not possible to go to school regularly due to their illness. In addition to the illness, they often have to deal with social isolation, the loss of friends and reduced contact with the family due to numerous hospital stays. The consequences of this social isolation are emotional stress, psychological sequelae and the loss of school skills. That is why we have launched the project Be PART of it!
Through this project we want to enable children and young people with a chronic illness to stay in contact with their classmates and not to lose touch in class with the help of the avatar A1.
The Avatar AV1 is a robot that can be controlled from anywhere using an app. The image and sound are transmitted and the child/teenager can either communicate via his/her microphone or by changing the facial expression of the robot. It is also possible to personalize the avatar A1, for example by putting stickers on it or painting it.
It is important to collect information about the changes that occur in children and adolescents with chronic diseases as a result of the avatar AV1, so that targeted psychological and educational support can be provided in the future. We are trying to find out how the use of the Avatar AV1 affects school participation, sense of belonging, quality of life and self-esteem of children and adolescents with chronic diseases.
By incorporating all of these steps into our research process, the goal is to enable children and adolescents with a chronic illness to have better long-term school and daily participation. If you would like to learn more about the Avatar, feel free to watch this video: