Design of a therapeutic robotic companion for relational, affective touch

Stiehl, Walter Dan; Lieberman, Jeff; Breazeal, Cynthia; Basel, L.; Lalla, Levi; Wolf, Marilyn

doi:10.1109/roman.2005.1513813

Cited by 152 publications

(103 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Huggable [16] is the most relevant due to its full-body sensitive skin. This furry teddy bear companion has a wide range of sensors around its body, and its initial gesture recognition engine identifies nine classes of touch: tickle, poke, scratch, slap, pet, pat, rub, squeeze and contact.…”

Section: Touch-sensitive Social Robotsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While these are promising directions, none individually tells enough of the story to model emotion accurately [15,6,16,3]. In the case of * e-mail:me@annaflagg.com † e-mail:maclean@cs.ubc.ca touch sensing, current social robots -which rely largely on force and electric field sensors -would not be able to classify gestures adequately even if used in combination (Section 2).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Conductive fur sensing for a gesture-aware furry robot

Flagg

Tam

MacLean

et al. 2012

2012 IEEE Haptics Symposium (HAPTICS)

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Recent advances in artificial intelligence suggest that machines will soon be capable of communicating in ways previously considered out of their reach. For example, humans engage in sophisticated emotional communication through the language of touch. What technical capabilities would enable computers to do the same?As our group examines this question in the context of emotional touch between a person and a furry social robot, we require sensors designed to detect and recognize subtle, nuanced touches. To this end, we demonstrate a new type of sensor based on conductive fur, which is sensitive to movements unavailable to conventional pressure sensors. The sensor captures motion by measuring changing current as the fur's conductive threads connect and disconnect during touch interaction. We then use machine learning to classify gestures from this time series. An informal evaluation with seven participants found 82% recognition of a 3-gesture set, showing promise for this approach to gesture recognition, and opening a path to emotionally intelligent touch sensing.

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Section: Touch-sensitive Social Robotsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conductive fur sensing for a gesture-aware furry robot

Flagg

Tam

MacLean

et al. 2012

2012 IEEE Haptics Symposium (HAPTICS)

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“…To realize a full-body sense of touch, a sensitive skin will be used. A good example is being developed (by Stiehl et al [17]) for a therapeutic robotic companion named: The Huggable. In another approach, research has started for the use of photonic crystal fibers [18] which will be implemented in some parts of Probo, such as the trunk.…”

Section: Multi-disciplinary Robotic User Interfacementioning

confidence: 99%

The Huggable Robot Probo, a Multi-disciplinary Research Platform

Goris

Saldien

Vanderniepen

et al. 2009

Communications in Computer and Information Science

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Abstract. The concept of the huggable robot Probo is a result of the desire to improve the living conditions of children in hospital environment. These children need distraction and lots of information. In this paper we present the concept of this new robot. The robot will be employed in hospitals, as a tele-interface for entertainment, communication and medical assistance. To communicate according to social rules, the robot needs the ability to show facial expressions. Using a well defined set of Action Units (AU) it's possible to express some basic emotions. A prototype of the robot's head, capable of showing these basic emotions is presented. In order to express emotions, an emotional interface is developed. The emotions, represented as a vector in an 2D emotion space, are mapped to the DOF used in the robot. A graphical user interface to control the virtual and real prototype is also presented.

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“…In particular, researchers' efforts have been focused on the design of novel services to accomplish different daily activities based on the integration and cooperation of companion robots and other agents such as smart environments (Tiwari et al 2010). Many research groups and companies have developed robotic solutions, which could support both older people and the rest of the population during daily activities such as participation in performing specific tasks (Iwata and Sugano 2009;Mukai et al 2008), acting as companion robots (Stiehl et al 2005;Zhang et al 2008), or providing complex assistive services (Meyer et al 2009;Badii et al 2009). …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enabling personalised medical support for chronic disease management through a hybrid robot-cloud approach

et al. 2016

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Information and Communication Technology and personal robots could play a fundamental role in efficiently managing chronic diseases and avoiding improper medications. They could support senior citizens with reminders, thus promoting their independent living and quality of life, especially in the presence of several chronic diseases (multimorbidity). In this context, this article proposes a service model for personalised medical support that is able to provide adequate healthcare service by means of a hybrid robot-cloud approach. This service was quantitatively and qualitatively tested to assess the technical feasibility and user acceptability level of the service. The service was tested with 23 older people (65-86 years) in the DomoCasa Lab (Italy). This study demonstrated the feasibility of the proposed hybrid cloud solution and the usability and acceptability were positively evaluated thus confirming the ability to utilise these innovative technologies for active and healthy ageing.

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Design of a therapeutic robotic companion for relational, affective touch

Cited by 152 publications

References 12 publications

Conductive fur sensing for a gesture-aware furry robot

Conductive fur sensing for a gesture-aware furry robot

The Huggable Robot Probo, a Multi-disciplinary Research Platform

Enabling personalised medical support for chronic disease management through a hybrid robot-cloud approach

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