Papers

Payr, S. 2010. Closing and Closure in Human-Companion Relationships

A field study with a simple robotic companion is being undertaken in three iterations in the framework of a EU FP7 research project. The interest of this study lies in its design: the robotic interface setup is installed in the subjects' homes and video data are collected during ten days. This gives the rare opportunity to study the development of human-robot relationships over time, and the integration of companion technologies into everyday life. This paper outlines the qualitative inductive approach to data analysis, and discusses selected results. The focus here is on the interactional mechanisms of bringing conversations to an end. The paper distinguishes between "closing" as the conversational mechanism for doing this, and "closure" as the social norm that motivates it. We argue that this distinction is relevant for interaction designers insofar as they have to be aware of the compelling social norms that are invoked by a companion's conversational behaviour.

Klamer & BenAllouch 2010: Zoomorphic robots used by elderly people at home

Klamer, Tineke, and Somaya Ben Allouch. 2010. Zoomorphic robots used by elderly people at home. In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. ACM International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI-2010). Atlanta, GA: ACM Press.

Wallis et al. 2010: Conversation in Context ...

Wallis, Peter, Viktoria Maier, Sarah Creer, and Stuart Cunningham. 2010. Conversation in Context: what should a robot companion say? . In Proceedings of EMCSR 2010, edited by R. Trappl. Vienna.

Klamer & BenAllouch 2010: Acceptance and Use of a Zoomorphic Robot ...

Klamer, Tineke, and Somaya BenAllouch. 2010. Acceptance and Use of a Zoomorphic Robot in a Domestic Setting In Proceedings of EMCSR 2010, edited by R. Trappl. Vienna.

Payr, S. 2010. Ritual or Routine

On the basis of data extracted from a longterm experiment with a robotic user interface, the paper discusses prerequisites and functions of interaction rituals.

Eimler et al. 2010: Prerequisites for Human-Robot Interaction ...

Eimler, Sabrina, Nicole C. Krämer, and Astrid von der Pütten. 2010. Prerequisites for Human-Agent- and Human-Robot Interaction: Towards an Integrated Theory. In Proceedings EMCSR 2010, edited by R. Trappl. Vienna: OSGK.

Ganster et al. 2010: Methodological Considerations ...

Ganster, Tina, Sabrina Eimler, Astrid von der Pütten, Laura Hoffmann, and Nicole C. Krämer. 2010. Methodological Considerations for Long-Term Experience with Robots and Agents. In Proceedings of EMCSR 2010, edited by R. Trappl. Vienna.

Payr et al. 2009. Research on Social Engagement with a Rabbitic User Interface

Payr, Sabine, Peter Wallis, Stuart Cunningham, and Mark Hawley. 2009. Research on Social Engagement with a Rabbitic User Interface. In Roots for the Future of Ambient Intelligence. Adjunct Proceedings, 3rd European Conference on Ambient Intelligence (AmI09), edited by M. Tscheligi, B. de Ruyter, J. Soldatos, A. Meschtscherjakov, C. Buiza, N. Streitz and T. MirlacherSalzburg: ICT&S Center. Companions as interfaces to smart rooms need not only to be easy to interact with, but also to maintain long-term relationships with their users. The FP7-funded project SERA (Social Engagement with Robots and Agents) contributes to knowledge about and modeling of such relationships. One focal activity is an iterative field study to collect real-life long-term interaction data with a robotic interface. The first stage of this study has been completed. This paper reports on the setup and the first insights.

Hudlicka, Payr et al. 2009: Social interaction with robots and agents: Where do we stand, Where do we go?

Hudlicka E, Payr S, Ventura R, Becker-Asano C, Fischer K, Leite I, Paiva A, von Scheve C. 2009: Social interaction with robots and agents: Where do we stand, Where do we go? Proc. Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction 2009:698-703. Robots and agents are becoming increasingly prominent in everyday life, taking on a variety of roles, including helpers, coaches, and even social companions. A core requirement for these social agents is the ability to establish and maintain long-term trusting and engaging relationship with their human users. Much research has already been done on the prerequisites for these types of social agents and robots, in affective computing, social computing and affective HCI. A number of disciplines within psychology and the social sciences are also relevant, contributing theories, data and methods relevant for the emerging areas of social robotics, and social computing in general. However, the complexity of the task of designing these social agents, and the diversity of the relevant disciplines, can be overwhelming. This paper presents a summary of a special session at ACII 2009 whose purpose was to provide an overview of the state-of-the-art in social agents and robots, and to explore some of the fundamental questions regarding their development, and the evaluation of their effectiveness.

Heylen et al. 2009: Social agents: the first generation

D.K.J. Heylen, M. Theune, H.J.A. op den Akker and A. Nijholt Social Agents: the first generations, in Proceedings 2009 International Workshop on Social Signals Processing, M. Pantic and A. Vinciarello (eds), ACII 2009 Proceedings, volume Volume 2, IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos, ISBN 978-1-4244-4799-2, pp. 114-120, 2009. Embodied Conversational Agents can be viewed as spoken dialogue systems with a graphical representation of a human body. But the embodiment is not the only difference. Whereas Spoken Dialogue Systems are mostly focused on computing the linguistic dimensions of communication, conversational agents are conceived as intelligent agents that have an identity, a persona. Thus, cognitive modeling is often more involved in ECAs including the modeling of emotion. Whereas spoken dialogue systems are focused on the task, virtual humans are also equipped with social skills involved in interaction. This can take various forms. In this paper we review some of the approaches that have been taken in the first decade of ECA research, by presenting the social signaling skills of three agents we have developed in our group.

Ruttkay et al. 2009: Proceedings IVA 2009

Ruttkay, Zsofie, M. Kipp, A. Nijholt, and Hannes Vilhjalmsson, eds. 2009. Intelligent Virtual Agents, IVA 2009 Proceedings, LNAI 5773,. Heidelberg: Springer.