Our HAI2017 paper got mentioned in Heise Online

Our paper got mentioned in a whole paragraph. This is one of Germany’s biggest IT magazines. I have used google translate to translate the article from Germany to English. Please see below

Bielefeld also attracted a lot of Japanese. For example, Haruka Kasuga (Hokkaido University) presented a study of how a robot can change the relationship between humans and their pets. For this, the humanoid robot Nao was programmed to speak either positively or negatively to the animals. The result is not surprising: Nao's attitude affects the way he is perceived by humans and animals (in the opinion of their owners).

Robot on the dashboard

Many of the lectures are workshop reports that present interim results from ongoing studies. For example, Takahiro Tanaka (Nagoya University) reported experimenting with a digital assistant to assist older drivers, thereby increasing road safety. Three variants were compared: In the first, the agent was only present as a voice, which gave warnings and hints. In the second he appeared as an Avatar on a monitor, where he underlined the hints with gestures. And finally, there was the third variant where a small, humanoid robot sits on the dashboard, telling the driver with words and gestures of stop signs, parking cars, and other critical situations.

The robot had the most positive effect, according to Tanaka. This is not only a result of the subjective assessments of the participants but also of their eye movements. When the robot was sitting in front of them, the focus was on the most concentrated, and there were the fewest distractions. Tanaka and his research colleagues suspect that the "fellow passenger effect" is used here, according to which people drive more carefully when they have a passenger in the car. But this must be examined more closely.

Approaching drone with face

The research on the human-drone interaction, which is carried out especially at the Swedish Chalmers University of Technology, is also very early. Alexander Yeh described a study conducted jointly by Japanese researchers to investigate how close people approach a flying robot. It turned out that the distance, which they still felt comfortable, turned out to be less so if the drone was equipped with a face and people could speak with one voice. Even if she came from the side and flew at an altitude of 180 centimeters instead of 120 centimeters, she was allowed to get closer. It was also shown that test persons, who had experience with pets, were less easily confused by a drone than others.

Credit : https://m.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/HAI-2017-Humanoide-Roboter-sind-immer-noch-die-beliebtesten-Agenten-3865154.html