Exploring Parenting-Support Needs with Robots: A Study Focused on Mothers' Psychological Trait Types

要旨

A significantly increased number of Japanese mothers are experiencing isolated parenting and mental and physical stress. This trend is especially evident during the period when a child's ego starts to emerge, between the ages of 2 and 3. During this time, often called the ``terrible twos,'' both parents and children are prone to heightened stress and require comprehensive support. There is growing interest in addressing these challenges utilizing information technology and AI-equipped robots that assist with parenting duties. However, there are substantial variations in mothers' psychological traits and the parenting-stress levels they experience. This study explored mothers' expectations about using parenting-support robots and how those expectations relate to mothers' psychological traits, psychological states, and stress levels. Findings categorized mothers into two distinct types: Negative trait-High stress, characterized by strong negative psychological traits and high parenting stress, and Positive trait-Low stress, characterized by positive psychological traits and low parenting stress. Negative trait-High stress type mothers were found to have specific expectations regarding the effectiveness of parenting-support robots in soothing their children's crying episodes. A key future challenge is to conduct fundamental research that facilitates the development of ``personalized'' parenting-support methods that account for individual differences, such as mothers' psychological traits.

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