UNIVERSITY OF HERTFORDSHIRE
		COMPUTER SCIENCE RESEARCH COLLOQUIUM

			     presents


                 "Why Should You Care?" - Attachment  
                     Bonds for Autonomous Robots

		           Antoine Hiolle 
	          (Adaptive Systems Research Group,
		    University of Hertfordshire)


		      29 April 2009 (Wednesday)

			 Lecture Theatre B404 
		   Hatfield, College Lane Campus
			      3 - 4 pm

	    Coffee/tea and biscuits will be available.

		   Everyone is Welcome to Attend



Abstract:

Towards developing more interesting and interested robots,
we followed a development approach inspired by the behaviour
of infants during their early years. During this period of their
development, the attachment bond between the infant and
the mother influence the exploratory behaviour and  the overall
well-being of the infant. She has the unconditional ability to
relieve the infant distress by providing comfort, for instance
when the infant faces unknown situations.

Within the European project FEELIX GROWING, tackling
the issues of socially situated development, we developed an 
architecture allowing a human to influence the behaviour of 
an AIBO robot exploring and learning the features of a child
play mat. Depending on the availability of the human to the robot 
needs, the learning experience of the robot differs greatly.
Since the architecture also offers the possibility to change the level
of  "neediness" of the robot, we confronted human subjects wth two
different robot profiles, one needy robot and one more independent,
and analysed their reactions.

[This talk reports joint work with Dr. Lola Canamero.]

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Hertfordshire Computer Science Research Colloquium
http://homepages.feis.herts.ac.uk/~nehaniv/colloq