P. Bremner, A. Pipe, Mike Fraser, S. Subramanian, C. Melhuish
{"title":"Beat gesture generation rules for human-robot interaction","authors":"P. Bremner, A. Pipe, Mike Fraser, S. Subramanian, C. Melhuish","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326136","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326136","url":null,"abstract":"In order for anthropomorphic robots to communicate with people in a human-like way they need to produce gestures along with speech. Beat gestures are a key category of gestures, accompanying emphasis and timing of talk. The standard approach for autonomously adding gestures to speech for artificial agents to perform, is to identify when gestures should occur, and then select appropriate movements from a prewritten library. However, selecting naively from a library is unlikely to result in particularly human-like gesture sequences. In order to obtain examples of engaging human beat gestures, we studied videos of chat show hosts. Our analysis reveals rules for the creation of human-like beat gestures. We have combined these rules with hand scripted non-beat gestures, to produce a monologue with a complete set of accompanying gestures; it is designed for performance by our humanoid robot BERTI. In order to test the gestures produced we carried out a pilot study at the London Science Museum. The results of the study indicate that having correctly designed gesture sequences improves observer engagement.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129045693","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Exploring play styles with a robot companion","authors":"P. Marti, L. Giusti, A. Pollini","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326229","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326229","url":null,"abstract":"This article presents the design of Iromec, a modular robot companion tailored towards engaging in social exchanges with children with different disabilities with the aim to empower them to discover a wide rage of play styles from solitary to social and cooperative play. In particular this paper focuses on the design of play scenarios and specific robot features for engaging in meaningful interaction with different typologies of disable children - Autistic children, Moderate Mentally Retarded children and Severe Motor Impaired children. Modularity and configurability contribute to the flexibility of the system in creating rewarding games that can be easily understood by the child and can promote fun and learning. Other key features of the system are the combination of autonomous and user-controlled behaviour and a strong emphasis on identity and expressiveness that can be dynamically adapted during play.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"114 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123236900","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Conversation system based on Boltzmann selection and Bayesian networks for a partner robot","authors":"N. Kubota, Takeru Mori","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326078","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326078","url":null,"abstract":"Human interaction based on conversation and gestures is very important to realize the natural communication. This paper proposes a conversation system composed of topic selection module, conversation control module and utterance selection module. First, we apply a Bayesian network for the topic selection, and Boltzmann selection for the control of conversation. We apply Term Frequency Inverse Document Frequency for representing the features of a document by a weight vector of terms used in the document. The experimental results show that the proposed method can select topics according to the perceptual information and human interaction.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"58 6","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"120954273","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Evaluations of embedded modules dedicated to multimodal human-robot interaction","authors":"B. Burger, F. Lerasle, I. Ferrané","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326298","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326298","url":null,"abstract":"With personal robotics and assistance to dependant people, robots are in continuous interface with humans. To enable a more natural communication, based on speech and gesture, robots must be endowed with auditive and visual perception capacities. This paper describes a modular multimodal interface based on speech and gestures in order to control an interactive robot called Jido. In this paper we describe how the speech recognition and understanding module processes deictic and anaphoric utterances in a robust way and how gesture is taken into account at the fusion level to complement speech utterances. These two other modules, namely gesture interpretation and probabilistic multimodal fusion are then briefly depicted. Their integration and the associated robotics experiments are finally reported. These experiments were carried out in the context of a multimodal interactive manipulation task involving successive local motion and handling commands. Our object exchange scenario was successfully run several times with different users.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"11 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116510901","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Therapeutic and educational objectives in robot assisted play for children with autism","authors":"E. Ferrari, B. Robins, K. Dautenhahn","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326251","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326251","url":null,"abstract":"This article is a methodological paper that describes the therapeutic and educational objectives that were identified during the design process of a robot aimed at robot assisted play. The work described in this paper is part of the IROMEC project (Interactive Robotic Social Mediators as Companions) that recognizes the important role of play in child development and targets children who are prevented from or inhibited in playing. The project investigates the role of an interactive, autonomous robotic toy in therapy and education for children with special needs. This paper specifically addresses the therapeutic and educational objectives related to children with autism. In recent years, robots have already been used to teach basic social interaction skills to children with autism. The added value of the IROMEC robot is that play scenarios have been developed taking children's specific strengths and needs into consideration and covering a wide range of objectives in children's development areas (sensory, communicational and interaction, motor, cognitive and social and emotional). The paper describes children's developmental areas and illustrates how different experiences and interactions with the IROMEC robot are designed to target objectives in these areas.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"11 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125492676","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Gait pattern generation for a power-assist device of paraplegic gait","authors":"T. Kagawa, Y. Uno","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326348","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326348","url":null,"abstract":"We address a gait pattern generation on a legged locomotor device (WPAL: Wearable Power-Assist Locomotor) for paraplegics. In the gait movement with WPAL, a backward falling is a considerable problem, and a foot-floor collision during a swing movement would induce a loss of balance. In addition, adjustability of the gait parameters, such as stride length, gait cycle and maximum hight of the toe clearance, would be required for an individual paraplegic according to the degrees of his disabilities and skills. In this paper, we propose a gait pattern generation method considering the requirements of the stability and the adjustability. First, the trajectories of toe position, horizontal hip position, and foot plantar angle are calculated using a minimum jerk trajectory with the constraints of the position and velocity at via points. Second, the desired trajectories of joint angles are determined from the calculated trajectories by inverse kinematic equations. We demonstrate that generated desired trajectories for various gait parameter values and boundary conditions were satisfied with the required stability conditions.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121849142","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Control of a power assist robot for lifting objects based on human operator's perception of object weight","authors":"S. Rahman, R. Ikeura, M. Nobe, H. Sawai","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326343","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326343","url":null,"abstract":"An object lifted with a power assist robot is always perceived lighter than its actual weight. But, the human operator cannot differentiate between the power assisted weight and the actual weight and eventually applies load force (vertical lifting force) according to the actual weight of the object. This faulty force programming (excessive load force) gives faulty motions to the power assist robot and jeopardizes its operability, maneuverability, ease of use, naturalness, human-friendliness, safety etc. In this paper we assume that these problems still exist with the power assist robots because human's weight perception is not included in the design and control of the conventional power assist robots .We hypothesize that human's perception of weight due to inertial force may be different from the perceived weight due to gravitational force for lifting object with a power assist robot. Based on this hypothesis, we designed a 1 DOF power assist robot and established a psychophysical relationship between the actual weights and the power assisted weights for the objects lifted with the robot. We also determined the excess of the load forces that humans applied. Then, we modified the control system of the power assist robot based on the psychophysical relationship and the load force characteristics. The modification of the control system reduced the peak load forces applied by humans and thus enhanced maneuverability, naturalness, ease of use, stability, safety etc. of the robot system significantly. Finally, we proposed using the findings to design human-friendly power assist robots for carrying heavy objects in various industries.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"25 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134354997","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
G. Capi, Toshihide Takahashi, Kazunori Urushiyama, S. Kawahara
{"title":"Controlling the robot using the brain signals","authors":"G. Capi, Toshihide Takahashi, Kazunori Urushiyama, S. Kawahara","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326236","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326236","url":null,"abstract":"The goal of this work is to create a part mechanical, part biological robot that operates on the basis of the neural activity of rat brain cells. In our method, first the rat learns to move the robot by pressing the right and left lever in order to get food. Then, we utilize the data of multi-electrode recordings to train artificial neural networks, which are later employed to control the robot motion based on the brain activity of rats. The results show a good performance of artificial neural network controlling the real robot.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"56 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131475170","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"COMPANION: A Constraint-Optimizing Method for Person-Acceptable Navigation","authors":"Rachel Kirby, R. Simmons, J. Forlizzi","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326271","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326271","url":null,"abstract":"This paper introduces the COMPANION framework: a Constraint-Optimizing Method for Person-Acceptable NavigatION. In this framework, human social conventions, such as personal space and tending to one side of hallways, are represented as constraints on the robot's navigation. These constraints are accounted for at the global planning level. In this paper, we present the rationale for, and implementation of, this framework, and we describe the experiments we have run in simulation to verify that the method produces human-like behavior in a mobile robot. Our approach is novel in that it can express an arbitrary number of social conventions and explicitly accounts for these conventions in the planning phase.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"142 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133228981","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Homotopy-based controller for physical human-robot interaction","authors":"Paul Evrard, A. Kheddar","doi":"10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326065","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326065","url":null,"abstract":"This paper presents a model that describes physical interactions during dyadic collaborative tasks. This model is based on a homotopy between two controllers and defines the behavior of each partner as the result of a time-varying balance between two roles: the leader role, which consists in acting according to a plan without considering the other partner's intentions; and the follower role, which conversely consists in acting only based on the intentions of the other partner. The continuous switch between these two attitudes is described by two variables whose time-profile can define a task signature. After a brief presentation of the model, two illustrative scenarios are detailed to give more insights on how the homotopy parameter can be used to describe different situations that can occur in collaborative tasks between two partners. We especially focus on how some recent results in the human-human interaction can be encompassed by our proposed model. Experiments are performed to assess the usability of the model as a control scheme to implement advanced collaborative behaviors on a robotic platform.","PeriodicalId":187657,"journal":{"name":"RO-MAN 2009 - The 18th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication","volume":"51 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131696715","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}