Keynote abstract and title are updated. Schedule is updated (March 6, 2008)

Keynote speaker is announced!

Urgent: (January 24, 2008) Those participants that have not contacted Alan Wagner with their flight information, should do so ASAP: alan.wagner at cc.gatech.edu or phone 1 (404) 667-5193.

The field of human-robot interaction is new but growing rapidly. While there are now several established researchers in the field, many of the current human-robotic interaction practitioners are students or recently graduated. This workshop, to be held in conjunction with the HRI 2008 conference, aims to bring together this group of researchers to discuss their work, talk about the important upcoming issues in the field, and hear about what their colleagues are doing. The workshop is the third annual workshop for junior researchers in HRI held in conjunction with the HRI conference. Those who have not attended a previous session are highly encouraged to submit to this workshop. Previous attendees will be considered for acceptance as well.

We would like to announce Dr. Brian Scassellati of the Yale University as our keynote speaker. Prof. Brian Scassellati is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Yale University, Director of the Yale Social Robotics Laboratory, and a member of the Yale Child Study Center. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering from MIT in 2001, M.Eng. in Computer Science from MIT in 1995, and a B.S. in both Computer Science and Brain and Cognitive Science from MIT in 1995. He is currently the chairman of the Autonomous Mental Development Technical Committee of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society and has received an NSF Career Award. His research focuses on the construction of humanoid robots that interact with people using natural social cues. These robots are used both to evaluate models of how infants acquire social skills and to assist in the diagnosis and quantification of disorders of social development (such as autism). Research details can be found at http://www.cs.yale.edu/~scaz.

Social Robots and Human Social Development
Abstract: In HRI studies, we often use the robot as a stimulus to study the social behavior of a human. In this talk, I'll describe two related methods for using a robot to gain insight into the cognitive structure of human social behavior:

• Robot as model. I'll provide four examples of how implementing models of social development on a physical robot has given us insight into human behavior. These examples cover topics of perceptual development (vocal prosody), sensorimotor development (declarative and imperative pointing), linguistic development (learning pronouns), and cognitive development (self-other discrimination).
• Robot as diagnosis and treatment. I'll discuss on-going work that focuses on using robots to aid in the diagnosis and treatment of social deficits (autism) and show some of the structure that these experiments have uncovered.

The format of the workshop will have participants presenting their work in short talks, hearing from an expert in the field on the important problems in HRI, and meeting in small group sessions to discuss common research themes.

The workshop will take place on March 12, 2008, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, in conjunction with the HRI 2008 Conference to be held there on March 12-15. Potential participants are encouraged to submit an abstract of their current research, a 1 paragraph statement of motivation for attending the workshop, and a letter of support from their research advisor by 1 October 2007 to [email protected]. Please limit abstracts to two pages.

We plan to accept approximately 30 students and young researchers to the workshop. Twelve will be asked to give a brief (10 minute) talk to the workshop about their work. The remainder will be expected to talk about their work during breakout sessions and meals.

Attendees and schedule.

• Dr. Adriana Tapus, University of Southern California, USA (Chair)
• Jennifer Burke, University of South Florida (Funding co-PI)
• M. A. Neerincx, Delft University of Technology, (Funding co-PI)
• Rosemarijn Looije, TNO Defence, Security and Safety, The Netherlands
• Maxim Makatchev, Carnegie Mellon, USA
• Marek Michalowski, Carnegie Mellon, USA
• Kristen Stubbs, Carnegie Mellon, USA
• Alan Wagner, Georgia Tech, USA

• Ron Arkin, Georgia Tech, USA
• Aude Billard, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, Switzerland
• Jennifer Burke, University of South Florida, USA
• Henrik Christensen, Georgia Tech, USA
• Kerstin Dautenhahn, University of Hertfordshire, UK
• Jodi Forlizzi, Carnegie Mellon, USA
• Robin Murphy, University of South Florida, USA
• Marjorie Skubic, University of Missouri, USA

• 1 October 2007 -- Abstract Submission Deadline
• 19 November 2007 -- Notification of Acceptance
• 12 March 2008 -- HRI Workshop
• 12-15 March 2008 -- HRI 2008 Conference