Robot communicates nonverbally

If robots one day at home and in public as a normal part of human society are accepted, they must be intuitiveto human action and respond to behave so that people understand it easier. At this year's "Human-RobotInteraction Conference (HRI) of the IEEE in La Jolla, California, researchers are now presenting the latestadvances in this field.Various scientific teams have long been looking for ways in which robots the subtle side of human nonverbalcommunication can detect and imitate: eye movements, gestures and physical contact. Mastering machinesonce these social niceties, which could help them, language issues and to work on human needs and respondto commands more precisely. This could be of enormous importance, experts believe, should actually robots inthe next few years, personal assistants, teachers or care assistance.Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University presented at the HRI first details of their experiments on a robot thatuses eye movements to the flow of communication with several people to steer. The technique was developedin collaboration with researchers from Osaka University and ATR Intelligent Robotics and CommunicationsLaboratory. The approach is intended, inter alia, for robots, as the receptionist in buildings or shopping malls, amuseum guide or tour guide work."The goal is to human communication mechanisms to be applied in robots so that human behavior correctlyinterpret and respond appropriately," says Bilge Mutlu, a member of the Carnegie Mellon team. "We want toeventually not unsociable, shy robot."The machine sounds from the experiments on the name Robovie and was previously developed at ATR. Thusthe robot language and views can combine, researchers developed the first accurate model of how people havetheir eyes during a conversation or discussion use. They dealt with the current literature in the field of socialcognition research, in order to develop predictive models to be able to. These were then further refined in thelaboratory data. All of that flowed into a software, which Robovie conversation in different scenarios can control.In the experiments, the machine played the role of a travel agency employee, the two trial participantswelcomed imagined them and then a series of questions, where they would like to outward. Three scenarioswere examined: the speech of a person, while others were ignored, the speech of a person, while the other withshort glances were perceived and the speech of both persons simultaneously, each with the same amount ofeye contact.The team found that the Robovie conversation flow easily, and could even lead. Those who are the robot thatwas longer, spoke more often, while those with only brief glances abbekamen, were less communicative. Thetest subjects were ignoring Robovie spoke as expected least. These patterns were roughly 97 percent of casesconsistently. In the future still looks Robovies for more non-verbal signals are added, such gestures.Another team, at the HRI conference attended by focusing on simple physical contact. With the help of a small,remote-controlled humanoid robot led researchers from the Netherlands through an experiment in which theyshowed how the robot volunteers convinced that he had them in the use of a computer could help. The testsubjects reported that the machine they like and less reliable machines happens, if this is made by offeringassistance and direct physical contact started - such as a knock on the shoulder or the high-five gesture. "Asnoted, that the way in which such behaviors are combined, plays an important role," says Henriette Cramer, aresearcher at the University of Amsterdam. Their team goal was to find out when and what physical contactworks. "We think that touch is an important aspect of interaction, and we want to further investigate effects -particularly in combination with other social behavior," she added."We want these robots to real human-like social skills lend," says Yale professor Brian Scassellati, Co-Directorof the HRI program. The field is still young, but it is growing fast. They can also learn much about human socialpsychology. "Actually, we have over the last decade, the necessary computing power and exercise capacity inthese machines, to really move forward."