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SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article

Front. Educ.

Sec. Digital Education

Volume 10 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/feduc.2025.1568028

This article is part of the Research TopicDigital Learning Innovations: Trends Emerging Scenario, Challenges and OpportunitiesView all 27 articles

Child engagement during interaction with digital and robotic activities: a systematic review

Provisionally accepted
Viola  MargheriViola Margheri1,2Alessia  MartucciAlessia Martucci3Eva  BeiEva Bei4Daniela  GrazianiDaniela Graziani3Stefano  ScatignaStefano Scatigna2,3Andrea  GuazziniAndrea Guazzini3Chiara  PeciniChiara Pecini2,3*
  • 1University of Florence, Florence, Italy
  • 2Department of Education, Languages, Intercultures, Literatures and Psychology, University of Florence, Firenze, Italy
  • 3Università di Firenze, Firenze, Italy
  • 4University of Bologna, Bologna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

In the last decades we assisted in the exponential increase of information and robotic technologies for remote learning and rehabilitation. Such procedures are associated with a decrease of human interaction and "in person" control of responses, characteristics that, especially when children or youth are involved, can affect learning performances. Thus, online quantitative, and qualitative indicators of child's psychological engagement are mandatory to personalize the interaction with the technological device. According to the literature, the studies on child engagement during digitalized or robotic tasks vary in terms of underpinning constructs, technological tools, measures, and results obtained. This systematic review was conducted with the general aim to provide a theoretical and methodological framework of children's engagement during digitalized and robotic tasks.The review included 27 studies conducted between 2014 and 2023. The sample size ranged from 5 to 299, including typically and atypically developing children, aged between 6 and 18 years. The results suggest the need for adopting a transversal approach including simultaneously emotional, behavioral and cognitive dimensions of engagement by diverse tools such as self-report questionnaires, video recordings, and eye-tracker. Although fewer studies have examined the relationship between children's engagement and task performance, existing evidence suggests a positive association between emotional, behavioral, and cognitive engagement and both task performance and skill acquisition. These results have implications for setting adequate protocols when using information and robotic technologies in child education and rehabilitation.

Keywords: Child, engagement, Learning analytics, digital task, robotic task, games, child-computer interaction

Received: 28 Jan 2025; Accepted: 02 Sep 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Margheri, Martucci, Bei, Graziani, Scatigna, Guazzini and Pecini. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Chiara Pecini, Department of Education, Languages, Intercultures, Literatures and Psychology, University of Florence, Firenze, Italy

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