Getting social with virtual peers.

Children with autism and related developmental disorders typically can't carry on a conversation or play cooperatively with peers. Encouragingly, though, life-size virtual youngsters can draw kids with autism into

social encounters, psychologist Justine Cassell of Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., reported June 5.

Cassell and her colleagues examined conversational skills in pairs of 7to 11-year-olds. Participants had to use toys to tell a story, first with a partner and later with a virtual peer. The virtual peers were 3-D, computerized versions of children programmed to be patient, give a lot of feedback and pause briefly before taking a turn in a conversation.

Unlike kids free of developmental disorders, children with autism contributed to stories, took turns in conversations, looked at their partners and suggested new story ideas more often with virtual peers than with flesh-and-blood partners. Cassell plans to explore whether regular exposure to computerized friends translates into improved real-life interactions for children with autism. Earth