Organization

Dr. Carolin Straßmann

Dr. Carolin Straßmann is a post-doctoral researcher at the Institute of Computer Science at Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences (HRW) in the field of human-technology interaction and social robots and project coordinator of the RuhrBots Competence Center. In her research, she mainly focuses on the impact and design of virtual agents and social robots. In doing so, she considers aspects such as appearance or non-verbal behavior in order to optimally adapt technologies to human needs. Currently, she is also researching the effects of possible emotion expressions of voice assistants by means of light and the effects of social robots on moral decision making.

Prof. Dr. Sabrina C. Eimler

Prof. Dr. Sabrina Eimler leads the Human Factors and Gender Studies group at the Hochschule Ruhr West – University of Applied Sciences in Bottrop, Germany. Her research and teaching focus on the impact of computer science on individuals and society and is inspired by psychology, cultural studies and economics. Prof. Eimler’s interdisciplinary team develops, explores and evaluates technology through the lens of gender and diversity aspects. Currently the group uses virtual and augmented reality applications for the simulation of future work and leisure environments with AI-based human-robot collaboration. The group explores biases in current technical functionalities and in what way people are affected by them. 

Dr. Alexander Arntz

Dr. Alexander Arntz is a research associate at the Institute of Computer Science at the Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences (HRW) in the Human Factors and Gender Studies group. He is an expert in the design, implementation and evaluation of virtual reality environments using digital twins of physical robots. Besides collaborative industrial robots, he also works with humanoid robot representations and is interested in impact factors on usability and expectation conformity as well as the successful orchestration of communication modalities for assistance robots. 

André Helgert

André Helgert is a research associate at Institute of Computer Science at the Hochschule Ruhr West – University of Applied Sciences in the Human Factors and Gender Studies group. Having a background at computer science his research focuses on the design and use of virtual reality for the exploration and reduction of stereotypes and discriminiation. He explores the usefulness of different interaction mechanics in sensitization settings and the integration of a variety of sensor data (e.g. eye tracking) for adaptive VR-environments. His work is used not only in interventions of reducing human-human discrimination but also in the context of psychological studies on stereotypes and algorithmic bias in human-robot-interaction.

Lara Timm

Lara Timm is also part of the Human Factors and Gender Studies group. She gained expertise in the field of participatory development of data glasses in hospital environments. Having an interdisciplinary background at the intersection of computer science and psychology, she uses mixed methods (focus groups, experiments) to assess individuals‘ perceptions of algorithmic biases, needs and visions (utopia, dystopia) in the interaction with modern technology, especially social robots in public spaces.

Lukas Erle

As part of the same team, Lukas Erle also has an interdisciplinary background combining computer science and psychology. He has been doing research on conversational agents, hybrid work and influencers in social media. As part of his current activities he is involved in researching social robots in public spaces and analysing individual preconditions in (non)usage patterns and motivations along the lines of gender and diversity aspects.