8 September 2008: this page is created.
16 January 2009: congratulations to the 28 accepted participants!
20 February 2009: Schedule added.
25 February 2009: Attendees, Keynote added. Some attendees have expressed interested in room-sharing at the conference hotel. Email Marek to get connected.

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 2009 conference, aims to bring together this group of researchers to present their current research to an audience of their peers in a setting that is less formal and more interactive than the main HRI conference; to talk about the important issues in their field; and to hear about what their colleagues are doing. Participants are encouraged to actively engage and form relationships with others by discussing fundamental topics in HRI and by engaging in hands-on group activities.

We are happy to report that the United States National Science Foundation has agreed to help fund the workshop. Attendees will receive information about what that means for workshop-related expenses.

We are pleased to have Matthias Scheutz delivering our keynote talk. Professor Scheutz is Director of the Human Robot Interaction Laboratory in the Cognitive Science Program at Indiana University.

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 10, 2009, in San Diego, CA, in conjunction with the workshops one day prior to the start of the HRI 2009 conference on March 11-13. Potential participants are encouraged to submit a two-page abstract of their current research, a one-paragraph statement of motivation for attending the workshop, and a letter of support from their research advisor by October 15, 2008, to our on-line application.

We have accepted 28 students and young researchers to the workshop. Nine will be asked to give a brief (15 minute plus 5 minutes discussion) talk to the workshop about their work. The remainder will be expected to talk about their work during breakout sessions and meals.

• Frank Broz, Carnegie Mellon University
• Maya Cakmak, Georgia Institute of Technology
• Sonia Chernova, Carnegie Mellon University
• Jeffrey Craighead, University of South Florida
• Henriette Cramer, University of Amsterdam
• Wende Frost, Arizona State University
• Kristof Goris, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
• Shane Griffith, Iowa State University
• Justin Hart, Yale University
• Richard Kelley, University of Nevada, Reno
• Eun Ho Kim, KAIST
• Alexandra Kirsch, Technische Universität München
• Paul Lapides, University of Calgary
• Lei Liu, Stanford University
• Felipe Machorro, CINVESTAV
• Ross Mead, University of Southern California
• Chung Hyuk Park, Georgia Institute of Technology
• Kevin Pratt, USF
• Laurel Riek, University of Cambridge
• Jelle Saldien, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
• Jivko Sinapov, Iowa State University
• Aaron St. Clair, University of Southern California
• Aggeliki Tsoli, Brown University
• Katherine Tsui, UMass Lowell
• Alberto Valero, SAPIENZA-University of Rome. Universidad Politecnica de Madrid
• Astrid Weiss, ICT&S Center, University of Salzburg
• Susana Zoghbi, University of British Columbia

• 8:00am-8:30am Welcome and introduction
• 8:30am-9:45am 15-min presentations: Broz, Chernova, Hart
• 9:45am-10:00am Coffee break
• 10:00am-11:00am Breakout 1: Themes
• 11:00am-12:00pm Keynote: Matthias Scheutz
• 12:00pm-1:15pm Lunch
• 1:15pm-2:30pm 15-min presentations: Kim, Riek, Saldien
• 2:30pm-4:00pm Breakout 2: Hands-on Activity
• 4:00pm-4:15pm Coffee break
• 4:15pm-5:30pm 15-min presentations: Tsui, Zoghbi, Cramer
• 5:30pm-6:30pm Group presentations
• 6:30pm-7:00pm Wrap-up
• 7:30pm Reception

• Alan Wagner, Georgia Tech, USA
• Rosemarijn Looije, TNO Defence, Security and Safety, The Netherlands
• Maxim Makatchev, Carnegie Mellon, USA
• Marek Michalowski, Carnegie Mellon, USA
• Emily Mower, USC, 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
• Adriana Tapus, University of Southern California, USA
• Robin Murphy, University of South Florida, USA
• Andrea Tomaz, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA

• 15 October 2008 - Application submission deadline
• November 2008 - Notification of acceptance
• 10 March 2009 - HRI Pioneers Workshop
• 11-13 March 2009 - HRI 2009 Conference

This workshop, and the HRI conference itself, will be held at the San Diego Marriott La Jolla. Some attendees have expressed interested in room-sharing at the conference hotel. Email Marek to get connected.

General information about attending the HRI conference, including registration, visas, accommodations, and travel, can be found here.