With new AI-powered avatars, we can give child welfare staff better tools to train conversation skills and engage children in conversations. This can revolutionise the training of employees and improve the lives of vulnerable children.
The Child Welfare Act is intended to ensure that children and young people who live in conditions that can harm their health and development receive the necessary help, care and protection. But despite Norway's commitment to children's rights, research reveals that the child welfare service has challenges when it comes to effective communication with children.
A basic premise for helping children exposed to neglect, violence or abuse is to talk to the child to obtain information about the child's experiences, so that adequate help and support measures can be put in place. A significant challenge in practice, however, is that professionals often do not follow what is considered 'best practice' in these conversations.
"Research has shown that children who have experienced difficulties can have complex needs when it comes to support and care. Child welfare personnel and other professionals face challenges related to understanding and communicating effectively with these children," says Gunn Astrid Baugerud, associate professor at OsloMet.
Open-ended questions are essential
To help children who are struggling, it's critical to talk to them to get information, understand their experiences, and provide early help. The use of research-based guidelines for conversations has been shown to increase children's openness and accuracy. Traditional training has not yielded good results and many professionals do not follow the best practices based on research when communicating with children.
The Ilma project, led by Associate Professor Gunn Astrid Baugerud, with a background in child welfare and psychology, will contribute to improving the training of child welfare employees through the use of artificial intelligence and avatars. Open-ended questions are essential for effective communication, and using research-based conversation methods has been shown to increase children's willingness to share and provide accurate information. The project is funded with NOK 12 million from the Research Council of Norway, and is run by researchers from OsloMet and SimulaMet.
"There is a need to improve conversation skills and frequent training among those who work with children and in the police. The Ilma project has developed an interactive dynamic avatar that resembles a real child for training these skills," says Baugerud.
Avatars in training
The Ilma project involves using avatars to practice information-gathering conversations and improve the conversation skills of professionals who work with children in vulnerable situations. This includes child welfare personnel, health personnel, schools, kindergarten personnel and the police. The program uses knowledge from developmental psychology and learning psychology in addition to artificial intelligence with the goal of preventing violence, sexual abuse, and neglect of children.
"We have developed advanced avatars for training in sensitive child welfare conversations, adapted to scenarios the employees face. The avatars simulate realistic interlocutors and they provide tailored feedback. This gives professionals the opportunity to practice communication in a risk-free, effective and empathetic way," says Baugerud.
She emphasises the importance of practising competence.
"The world's best football players don't stop training their skills. Skills start to decline just a few months after the training is completed, and therefore it is incredibly important that the competence is maintained continuously. Now we are working with Oslo kommune. The Norwegian Agency for Children and Family Affairs and 60 employees from the Child Welfare Service will train with avatars throughout 2024," says Baugerud.
The research attracts attention globally
The Ilma project, and the development of specific tools and training, shows how research and theory can be put to good use in practice. With increased awareness and better methods, children in the child welfare service and the legal system can experience being better taken care of and better followed up. This in turn will result in major cost savings for society.
The research in the Ilma project has also aroused international interest. Child welfare workers, police and health personnel in the United States and Australia have tested the avatar. International collaboration with countries such as Australia, Canada and the United States is committed to using avatars to improve how professionals communicate with children exposed to violence and abuse with the aim of making a global difference for vulnerable children.