Assessing Progress in Mastering Social Skills in Multiple Categories
Providing an interactive environment that requires a user to exercise one or more social skills to achieve a goal, and generating a simulation progress report indicative of the success of the user's exercise of the social skills during the interactive social simulation in a plurality of separate categories that are each related to the one or more social skills based on the user's interaction with the interactive environment.
1 . A social skills learning system, comprising:
an interactive social simulation module configured to provide an interactive environment that requires a user to exercise one or more social skills to achieve a goal; and
a learner module configured to generate a simulation progress report indicative of the success of the user's exercise of the social skills during the interactive social simulation in a plurality of separate categories that are each related to the one or more social skills based on the user's interaction with the interactive environment.
2 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to communicate verbally.
3 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to communicate non-verbally.
4 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein the success of the user in at least one of the categories is expressed as an assessment that has one of several possible values.
5 . The social skills learning system of claim 4 wherein the success of the user in at least one of the categories is indicative of the user's proficiency in that category.
6 . The social skills learning system of claim 4 wherein the success of the user in at least one of the categories is indicative of the user's progress in that category.
7 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to communicate face-to-face with another person in conformity with the norms of a specific culture.
8 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to effectively communicate in a foreign language and culture to accomplish a military objective.
9 . The social skills learning system of claim 8 wherein the face-to-face communication is with a civilian.
10 . The social skills learning system of claim 9 wherein the interactive social simulation is configured to allow the user to participate as a military person seeking to accomplish the military objective and wherein a virtual character in the interactive simulation functions as the civilian.
11 . The social skills learning system of claim 8 wherein the military objective is to implement a peacekeeping operation.
12 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to effectively communicate face-to-face with a patient to provide health care.
13 . The social skills learning system of claim 12 wherein the interactive social simulation is configured to allow the user to participate as a health care provider seeking to provide health care and a virtual character in the interactive simulation functions as a patient.
14 . The social skills learning system of claim 13 wherein the health care is to provide psychological help.
15 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to effectively communicate face-to-face in connection with law enforcement.
16 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to effectively communicate face-to-face in connection with plant safety inspections.
17 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein one of the social skills is to effectively communicate face-to-face in connection with providing customer service.
18 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein the success is based on a comparison between the user's interaction and cultural norms.
19 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein the interactive social simulation module is configured to:
allow the user to control the distance between a virtual character and another character in the simulation that is representative of the user; and
evaluate the distance between the virtual a character and the other character.
20 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein the interactive social simulation module is configured to receive and evaluate a gesture from the user.
21 . The social skills learning system of claim 20 wherein the interactive social simulation module is configured to allow the user to select the gesture from a menu of gestures.
22 . The social skills learning system of claim 20 further including a video camera and image processing apparatus configured to allow the user to act out the gesture.
23 . The social skills learning system of claim 1 wherein the interactive environment includes a virtual aide that provides advice to the user on what action to perform.
24 . The social skills learning system of claim 23 wherein the virtual aide is configured to translate the language for the user if the user is having difficulty understanding the language.
25 . The social skills learning system of claim 23 wherein the virtual aide is configured to respond to actions of the virtual character.
26 . A social skills learning process, comprising:
providing an interactive environment that requires a user to exercise one or more social skills to achieve a goal; and
generating a simulation progress report indicative of the success of the user's exercise of the social skills during the interactive social simulation in a plurality of separate categories that are each related to the one or more social skills based on the user's interaction with the interactive environment.