Human in the loop… or robot in the loop?
While interacting with a robot, humans treat it as a living being, ascribing intentions, mental states and emotions. But robots are a human creation and as with other technological achievements we also see through them the intentions of their creators. Our interactions with a robot reflect both kinds of knowledge. This Summer School will use recent advancements in research on dynamics of movement and talk in interactions to explore how this knowledge is manifested, how we can study it, and how such a study could inform artificial systems’ design.
The School aims at reframing some of the key questions in HRI, which are pertinent both to social and to general robotics. Robots are extensions of our abilities to act in the physical world, but, at least equally importantly, they are modulators of human-human relations. Thus bringing humane sensitivity to robotics research means not only researching the shapes and abilities of the systems themselves, but also what kinds of agents do we, humans, want to have in the loops of our interactions.
This edition of the summer school focuses on language and non-verbal (gestures, gaze, movement) communication strategies. It aims at combining interdisciplinary approaches to embodied communication and dialog in people and in hybrid human-robot teams. We invite speakers and participants coming from diverse backgrounds, from psychology and linguistics to cognitive robotics and AI, to tackle together what we believe are the key issues in social HRI:
- What values are carried by the looks and movements of a robot?
- How to read these values from interactions, from movement and its coupling to human movement?
- What value is carried by a similarity to a human? Do issues involving human-robot similarity pertain only to a humanoid form, or biological movement and particular movement-couplings as well? Is there an “uncanny valley” for such couplings?
What you will learn during the Summer School
The summer school is composed of 5 days of intense learning and social activities. We start with keynote lectures in the morning, continue with hands-on workshops during the day, and end with engaging discussion panels in the evening.
Lectures – Our Keynotes are at the frontiers of research on social aspects in Human-Robot Interaction, but also on the nature of communication, language, vocal and bodily interactivity in general. The lectures will give participants insights into the key dimensions that contribute to certain “feelings-in-interaction” and into the methods to study them and apply to artificially created systems
Workshops: robot programming – The first two days of the workshops are devoted to learning the basics of robot programming. Participants will be divided into groups taking courses on robots of their preference (the choice will be among 2-3 platforms, such as Furhat robot, e-pucks or Nao). You will learn the first steps to control behavior of the robot, get familiar with the software and basic concepts in programming interactive robots. You will develop simple interaction scenarios where both human and robot take part and be faced with design decisions on how such interactions should look like and how to implement them.
Workshops: interaction analysis – The second part of the school will introduce you to the methods for analyzing social interactions. We will invite you to investigate how values are realized in dyadic encounters, how many assumptions and expectations about such interactions we hold, and which of them should be realized by the artificial agents. You will get familiar with working on different kinds of data and learn methods of movement-coordination analysis as well as conversation analysis. Participants will have an opportunity to work on pre-prepared datasets, as well as on the data they collect during the workshops.
Discussion panels – In the evenings, after the whole day of learning and programming, we will let ourselves be less practical and ponder over open questions in the field of HRI. You will work in groups with other participants, having the opportunity to challenge your perspective with researchers and fellow students coming from diverse backgrounds.
Speakers and Tutors
- Merihan Alhafnawi (Princeton University)
- Tony Belpaeme (Ghent University)
- Marine Chamoux (Aldebaran part of United Robotics Group)
- Kerstin Fischer (University of Southern Denmark)
- Tom Froese (Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology)
- Hatice Gunes (University of Cambridge)
- Judith Holler (Radboud University and Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics)
- Emile Kroeger (United Robotics Group)
- Roger Moore (Sheffield University)
- Iris Nomikou (Portsmouth University)
- Hannah Pelikan (University of Linköping)
- Art Pilacinski (Ruhr-University Bochum)
- Ekaterina Sangati (Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology)
- Alessandra Sciutti (Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia)
- David Schlangen (University of Potsdam)
- Gabriel Skantze (KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Furhat Robotics)
- Michael Spranger (SONY Japan)
- Serge Thill (Radboud University)
- Janet Wiles (University of Queensland)
- Julian Zubek (University of Warsaw)
Programme
You can download Summer School Brochure here.
Practical info & Scholarship
The summer school will take place on September 18-23, 2023 in the European Centre for Geological Education in Chęciny, Poland (200km from Warsaw).
The fee is 660 EUR and covers: accommodation, meals, coffee breaks, and social events. Participants are expected to arrive on Sunday, September 17 in the evening. Check out will be on Saturday, September 23, after breakfast. The participants will stay in 2-person rooms with a dedicated bathroom.
There are scholarships available of 50% (330 EUR) or full fee waiver for IEEE Robotics and Automation Society members. If you would like to become a member, see: IEEE RAS website.
How to apply
The 4th International Summer School on Social HRI welcomes Master and PhD students, as well as early career researchers. We invite both participants with a background in robotics who are interested in the topic of social human-robot interaction, and those who work on language and communication, and seek hands-on experience with robotics. There is a limit of 60 participants.
The application deadline is May 5th 2023. Please find the application form here.
We will let you know about the results of your applications before May 18th.
Poster session – We expect all participants to present their work or research plans during a poster session. This will give you an opportunity to present your work to the 60+ participants and tutors of the summer school, but also to learn about the varied research of the other participants and get to know each other. The poster session will be held in the evening of Monday 18 September 2023.
Contact
If you have any questions, contact us at: hri.summerschool@psych.uw.edu.pl
Venue
The European Centre for Geological Education in Chęciny, Poland, is located 200 kilometers from Warsaw, in the heart of an old quarry in the Góry Świętokrzyskie. It is a modern research institute and a conference centre, operating within the structures of the University of Warsaw.
The project won The Best Public Facility Award in the international contest European Property Awards. The facility is 90% powered by renewable energy sources. The contemporary glass-and-steel building is beautifully incorporated into the landscape of forests and hills. The rocky slopes along with the regular, geometric forms of the Centre buildings remind visitors about the history of mineralogical wealth and local mining traditions. Thanks to the unique nature surrounding the Centre, beautiful countryside can be seen just outside the window.
Read more about the venue here.
Organizers
Human Interactivity and Language Lab, Faculty of Psychology, University of Warsaw
Joanna Rączaszek-Leonardi, Ewa Nagórska, Katarzyna Skowrońska, Konrad Zieliński, Wiktor Rorot, Julian Zubek
COgnitive RObotics LAB (COROLAB), University of Manchester
Angelo Cangelosi, Wenjie Huang
Scientific Advisory: Serge Thill (Radboud University)
With the support of:
The Summer School is organized under the auspices of two IEEE RAS Technical Committees (Cognitive Robotics TC and Human-Robot Interaction TC) and is co-financed by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 TRAINCREASE project (No 952324), EU H2020 PERSEO (No 955778), and IEEE RAS Summer Schools programme.
Past editions
2017
3rd Summer School held at Vila Nova de Milfontes, Alentejo, Portugal
2015
2nd Summer School held at Åland, Finland
2013
1st Summer School held at Christ’s College, Cambridge, UK