Perception of own and robot engagement in human–robot interactions and their dependence on robotics knowledge

Communication between socially assistive robots and humans might be facilitated by intuitively understandable mechanisms. To investigate the effects of some key nonverbal gestures on a human’s own engagement and robot engagement experienced by humans, participants read a series of instructions to a robot that responded with nods, blinks, changes in gaze direction, or a combination of these. Unbeknown to the participants, the robot had no form of speech processing or gesture recognition, but simply measured speech volume levels, responding with gestures whenever a lull in sound was detected. As measured by visual analogue scales, engagement of participants was not differentially affected by the different responses of the robot. However, their perception of the robot’s engagement in the task, its likability and its understanding of the instructions depended on the gesture presented, with nodding being the most effective response. Participants who self-reported greater robotics knowledge reported higher overall engagement and greater success at developing a relationship with the robot. However, self-reported robotics knowledge did not differentially affect the impact of robot gestures. This suggests that greater familiarity with robotics may help to maximise positive experiences for humans involved in human–robot interactions without affecting the impact of the type of signal sent by the robot.     

Classification of social laughter in natural conversational speech

We report progress towards developing a sensor module that categorizes types of laughter for application in dialogue systems or social-skills training situations. The module will also function as a component to measure discourse engagement in natural conversational speech. This paper presents the results of an analysis into the sounds of human laughter in a very large corpus of naturally occurring conversational speech and our classification of the laughter types according to social function. Various types of laughter were categorized into either polite or genuinely mirthful categories and the analysis of these laughs forms the core of this report. Statistical analysis of the acoustic features of each laugh was performed and a Principal Component Analysis and Classification Tree analysis were performed to determine the main contributing factors in each case. A statistical model was then trained using a Support Vector Machine to predict the most likely category for each laugh in both speaker-specific and speaker-independent manner. Better than 70% accuracy was obtained in automatic classification tests.     

环境的意义：规划设计的新视角——兼评《建成环境的意义——非言语表达方法》

本文简要介绍了阿摩斯·拉普卜特的环境行为学研究,对作者的研究方法——非言语表达方法进行了评述,探讨了环境蕴涵的意义及其如何影响人们的行为,并阐释了环境行为学研究与规划设计的关系以及拉氏环境行为学研究对规划设计工作的积极意义。     

浅谈网页设计中非语言符号的运用

科技的繁荣推动了设计领域的发展,随着多媒体的诞生网页设计成为其不可缺少的一部分。本文着重论述在新的时代背景下非语言符号在网页设计中所发挥的重要作用。     

The effect of nonverbal cues on relationship formation

An unprecedented number of relationships begin online, propelling online dating into a billion-dollar industry. However, while the online dating industry has created an effective mechanism for matching and accessing profiles, it has largely neglected the quality of communication between individuals. We investigate whether the lack of nonverbal cues (inherent in the text-based communication tools commonly used by dating sites) hinders communication and relationship formation. In this study, members of a dating website interacted through one of four randomly assigned versions of a text chat, where each version featured an increasing number of nonverbal communication cues. A survey was then administered regarding users’ perceptions of each other, the level and quality of information disclosure, and their interest in developing a relationship with the other person. Results suggest that restoring nonverbal cues through the use of avatars can help improve online interaction and relationship formation. Chat versions that featured more nonverbal cues were associated with more favorable perceptions, greater exchange of information, and a stronger desire to pursue a relationship. While both genders found nonverbal communication conducive to developing a relationship, men and women reacted differently to certain types of nonverbal communication.     

Affective design of products using an audio-based protocol: Application to eyeglass frame

The measurement and understanding of user emotions elicited by product appearance are critical elements of the product development process. This paper proposes a new emotion measurement method, called Auditory Parameter Method. It is a non-verbal technique that uses auditory stimuli (music samples) and association tests for evaluating a set of products, given by their pictures. From user-tests, it provides an assessment of these products according to a series of emotional dimensions. We present the methodological framework used to build the links between user's emotional responses and geometrical features of the products. The method is described on an application case, an eyeglass frame. Analysis of Variance models are employed to examine how various shape factors influence users' emotional responses. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our protocol, we compare the proposed method with the conventional Semantic Differential using Principal Component Analysis and Generalized Procrustes Analysis. The new protocol demonstrates interesting qualities for collecting the intuitive emotions of users and for providing a discriminant measurement of emotions. It can also be used by designers to stimulate creativity.     

Emotional response evoked when looking at and trying a new food product,measured through images and words. A case-study with novel fruit and vegetable smoothies

Little research has been published on emotional responses evoked by completely new, innovative food products. The objectives of the present study were 1) to assess the emotional response to new products (fruit and vegetable smoothies in a drink pouch) in two different scenarios: looking at the smoothie pouch, or tasting the smoothie with the smoothie pouch alongside; 2) to compare the information obtained when the participants use photographs or use words to express emotions. In the Pack-alone scenario, similar emotional spaces and sample configurations were obtained with both images and words. In the Pack-and-tasting scenario, the richness of the emotional response increased when using images. In both scenarios, the participants used a greater number of negative emotions when these were presented as images rather than as words. This could be considered an advantage, as it enables some negative emotional loads to be portrayed. The present results also demonstrate that evaluating the emotional response allows effective discrimination between samples with similar overall liking scores.     

Assisted-care robot based on sociological interaction analysis

This paper presents our on-going work in developing service robots that provide assisted-care to the elderly in multi-party settings. In typical Japanese day-care facilities, multiple caregivers and visitors are co-present in the same room and any caregiver may provide assistance to any visitor. In order to effectively work in such settings, a robot should behave in a way that a person who needs assistance can easily initiate help from the robot. Based on findings from observations at several day-care facilities, we have developed a robot system that displays availability to multiple persons and then displays recipiency to an individual who initiates interaction with the robot. In this paper we detail this robot system and its experimental evaluation.     

英美外教的非语言交际对英语学习的启示

非语言交际指的是语言行为以外的所有交际行为,它是交际中不可缺少的部分,文化的主要层次是通过非言语手段无意识地、含蓄地进行交流的。英美外教的非语言交际给学生学习英语和了解英美文化提供了很好的途径。本文结合问卷调查,探讨了英美外教的非语言交际,认为学生应该加强对外教非语言交际的学习意识,从而提高跨文化交际能力,达到英语学习的最终目的。