Co-Creating Buildable and Open Social Robot Study Companions with University Students

Farnaz Baksh, Matevz B. Zorec, Feiazie Baksh, Karl Kruusamae (2026). ICSR + ART 2026, London

Key Findings

Design for Assembly (DfA) and Design for Disassembly (DfD) interventions reshape how a build feels before they shorten how long it takes.

Across two studies with developers and first-time builders, system usability climbed from Poor to Excellent (SUS 59.4 → 89.4).

Perceived workload trended downward (NASA-TLX 4.29 → 4.00), and mean assembly time trended downward (21.4 → 13.7 minutes, with a learning effect among junior builders).

Perceived workload, not completion time, appears to govern whether students take up open hardware.

Orientation cues and navigation continuity for first-time builders emerged as the next documentation frontier.

Study Design & Method

Open-source social robots offer accessibility, repairability, and student empowerment, yet the build itself often presents a barrier: existing platforms either ship pre-assembled, foreclosing hands-on learning, or expose students to unfamiliar fasteners, opaque wiring, and inaccessible service points that erode engagement. Working with university students in Guyana and Estonia, the authors applied the Double Diamond framework to co-create the Robot Study Companion (RSC) v4.1: mapping pain points, then redesigning its chassis around twist-lock fasteners, snap-fit joints, and tool-free service latches. The redesign was evaluated across two studies with both developers and first-time builders using the System Usability Scale (SUS) and the NASA-TLX workload instrument.

Relevance to AI in Education

This paper contributes directly to understanding how AI systems interact with learners in authentic educational settings. It shows that co-created open social robots with DfA/DfD design achieve excellent usability, and — more importantly — that perceived workload predicts student uptake of open hardware better than build time. For STEM Education and Human AI Collaboration programs, the results suggest that accessibility interventions should target the subjective burden of assembly, not merely clock time, and that co-creation with students across diverse contexts (Guyana and Estonia) can surface pain points that designer-only processes miss. The work also connects to Open Source and Design Thinking values in education: repairability and tool-free service make the robot a site of continued learning rather than a disposable appliance, supporting the case for buildable platforms over pre-assembled ones in formal and informal settings.

Connected Concepts

Connected Articles

Bridging Instructional Design Framework Math — WIP: Bridging the Gap Between Instructional Design and Pedagogical Use: A Framework for Mathematics Educators

Edumirror Educational Social Dynamics — EduMirror: Modeling Educational Social Dynamics with Value-driven Multi-agent Simulation

Adaptive Virtual Patient Psychotherapy Training — The Empirically Grounded Adaptive Virtual Patient for Psychotherapy Training

GenAI Academic Search Workshop — Report on CHIIR 2026 Workshop on Generative AI and Academic Search (GAI&AS)

Cognitive Offloading LLM Synthesis Writing — Profiling cognitive offloading in LLM-mediated synthesis writing: Volume vs. content

Student Math Competence Clustering — Archetypes or ability? Clustering for modelling student mathematical competence

Citation

Baksh, F., Zorec, M. B., Baksh, F., & Kruusamäe, K. (2026). Co-Creating Buildable and Open Social Robot Study Companions with University Students. arXiv:2606.15239. ICSR + ART 2026, London.