Hi i'm new to Wordpress and was looking at the RSS and ATOM feature, i'm new to how these "feeds" work, and was wondering are they there for the user or do they help SE indexing also? because i was wondering whether it needs to be added to robots.txt or whether to add it to my sidebar?
Yes, you get back-links to your site and you allow people to see your latest content. But like all SEO you have to let people know about your feeds... Add them to RSS directories and RSS aggregators etc.
definitely will help, it will also help to increase visibility of your pages. and increase your traffic too.
they definitely build awareness of your site, and allow for relevant content for others to link to. it's a great way for natural link-building.
These feeds maximize your exposure, assuming you submit them to directories and such, which is always good.