Humanoids 2023: Building Bridges: A Workshop on Physical & Social Human-Robot Interaction

December 12th, in-person in EER-1.504 and online on Zoom: click here to join on Zoom

Austin, Texas, USA

The workshop’s format is hybrid: in person in EER-1.504 and online on Zoom

About the workshop

More and more application scenarios for robots (and humanoid robots in particular), including manufacturing, disaster recovery, household and healthcare settings, envision them to engage in rich, long and multi-modal interactions with humans, requiring both physical and social interaction components. Indeed, the above-listed scenarios feature prominently in the literature in physical human-robot interaction (pHRI), as well as the one in social human-robot interaction (sHRI). Curiously, however, the two research fields seem to develop along independent and parallel lines, with few and rare occasions for collaboration and exchanges of outcomes and best practices, one of the major examples being the design of humanoid robots, which take extremely different shapes: functional but bulky for loco-manipulation, friendly but weak for social applications. The objectives of this workshop are to (i) bring together the pHRI and sHRI research communities, and (ii) generate discussions bridging between these two fields, for instance on the personal, societal and ethical implications of physical contact in HRI, as well as the use of non-verbal communication through gestures, robot design, appearance or control.

List of topics

• Physical and social human-robot collaboration and interaction
• Sensor technology for physical-social human-robot interaction
• Controllers for physical-social human-robot interaction
• Humanoid robot hardware with physical and social skills
• Wearable robots, exoskeletons
• Non-verbal communication
• Emotional body language
• Ethics
• Safety

Program

Speakers

	Alessandro Roncone (University of Colorado Boulder) Title: Robots working with and around people Abstract: Robots have begun to transition from assembly lines, where they are physically separated from humans, to human-populated environments and human-enhancing applications, where interaction with people is inevitable. With this shift, research in human-robot interaction (HRI) has grown to allow robots to work with and around humans on complex tasks, augment and enhance people, and provide the best support to them. In this talk, I will provide an overview of the work performed in the HIRO Group and our efforts toward intuitive, human-centered technologies for the next generation of robot workers, assistants, and collaborators. More specifically, I will present our research on: a) robots that are safe to people, b) robots that are capable of operating in complex environments, and c) robots that are good teammates. In all, this research will enable capabilities that were not previously possible, and will impact work domains such as manufacturing, construction, logistics, the home, and health care.
	Patricia Alves-Oliveira (University of Michigan) Title: Robots for Vulnerable Populations Abstract: This talk explores the transformative potential of robots that engage in physical and social interaction with humans, particularly within vulnerable populations requiring assistance and education. Highlighting the design and development of YOLO, a child-focused robot fostering creative learning through embodied play, and a feeding system aiding individuals with motor disabilities to achieve dining independence, the talk delves into their design processes. Emphasizing the significance of well-researched co-design methodologies involving users and their communities, it underscores the pivotal role such collaborative co-design approaches play in crafting successful physical and social robots.
	Angelica Lim (Simon Fraser University) Title: Multimodal Machine Learning for Robot Social Intelligence and Empathy Abstract: In this talk, I will discuss the challenges and opportunities in creating multimodal machine learning systems that can analyze, detect and generate non-verbal communication, including gestures, gaze, auditory signals, and facial expressions. Specifically, I will provide examples in how we might allow robots to analyze human social signals (including emotions, mental states, and attitudes) across cultures, as well as to recognize and generate expressions with diversity in mind.
	Dongheui Lee (Technical University of Vienna) Title: HOI4ABOT: Human-Object Interaction Anticipation for Human Intention Reading Collaborative roBOTs Abstract: Robots are becoming increasingly integrated into our lives, assisting us in various tasks. To ensure effective collaboration between humans and robots, it is essential that they understand our intentions and anticipate our actions. In this talk, I will present a Human-Object Interaction (HOI) anticipation framework for collaborative robots. Our team developed an efficient and robust transformer-based model to detect and anticipate HOIs from videos. This enhanced anticipation empowers robots to proactively assist humans, resulting in more efficient and intuitive collaborations. We showcase the effectiveness of our approach through benchmark using VidHOI dataset and experimental results in a real robot.
	Francesco Ferro, Sai Kishor Kothakota, Adrià Roig (PAL Robotics) Title: Harmony in Motion: Designing Safe and Compliant Humanoid Robots for Physical and Social Interaction Abstract: This talk will discuss high-performance bipeds and their interactions with humans, including how their hardware and software help facilitate this. This talk will also detail the latest work at PAL Robotics including the newest platforms created and in development  – TIAGo Pro and Kangaroo – and the physical and social interactions we are working towards that are the key to successfully integrating robots into human environments.
	AJung Moon (McGill University) Title: Social and ethical implications of social vs physical interaction with robots Abstract: Interaction with robots are fundamentally different from that of virtual avatars or purely algorithmic systems because robots are physically present, corporeal things that move around our environment. In this talk, I unpack some of the social and ethical implications we must consider as we design interactive robots that share our physical world.
	Marie Charbonneau (University of Calgary) Title: Human-robot communication in robot-led partnered dancing Abstract: Touch is a central component of humans’ interactions with others and with the world. While robots are increasingly being developed to work alongside people, their capacity to interact with humans through touch remains limited. This talk will expose preliminary results from human-robot partnered dancing experiments, in which we explored communication between a person and a robot carrying out a common, closely physically interactive, task.
	Mehdi Benallegue, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) Title: Is a unique framework for controlling social and physical interactions possible? Abstract: While the dichotomy between social and physical human-robot interactions has deep groundings from the perspective of psychology and sociology, this separation from the point of view of motion control is mostly driven by the different incentives. For instance, expressivity and naturalness are key factors of social interaction while compliance and safety are required in physical interaction. Though there are indeed shared objectives, these differences seem to lead to dedicated control policies. In this talk, I want to open the discussion on the possibility and challenges of a unique control framework for social and physical interactions and emphasize the need to better understand how humans perform with respect to this. Examples of our most recent developments and models around this issue will be presented.

Contributions

Call for contributions: this workshop is to encourage dialogue between researchers, especially students.

Participants are welcome to submit a 1-2 pages paper in the IEEE Transactions double-column format as part of the workshop session. Accepted papers will have the opportunity to present their work at the workshop (as poster or short talk, format TBD depending on available resources at the conference) and will be made available on the workshop website. To contribute to the workshop, please see submission information below:

Contributed abstracts:

– Camilla Di Pasquasio: Assessing Social Competences of a Robotic Conversational Agent
– Shehata Hesham: Application of Security Robots for Detection and Dealing with Suspicious Behaviors in Public Places

Organizers – Contacts

Yue Hu

Assistant Professor

University of Waterloo

yue.hu [at] uwaterloo.ca [Main contact person]

Barbara Bruno

TT Professor

Karlsruhe Institute of Technology

barbara.baruno [at] kit.edu

Katja Mombaur

Professor

Karlsruhe Institute of Technology

University of Waterloo

katja.mombaur [at] kit.edu