Autonomous vehicles (AVs) can enhance older adults’ mobility and independence, but also present significant safety and usability challenges. In a two-phase formative study, we examine older adults’ (aged 60+) unique design requirements in AVs and the potential of a conversational AI agent inside AVs to support as digital chauffeurs. Phase 1 focus group (N=10) findings present physical AV design with accessible interfaces. We conducted an interview study (N=18) in phase 2 using a virtual reality (VR) simulator and a large-language model (LLM)-powered chatbot. Findings reveal that older adults value conversational agents that could assist during emergencies, initiate social conversations and provide a sense of control and agency. Informed by the outcome, we discuss design implications, emphasizing the need for transparency, clear communication, and chauffeur-like interaction norms in AI agents with appropriate anthropomorphic characteristics (i.e., pacing, tone, and frequency) to ensure a comfortable riding experience for older adults.

The visualization of temporal data on urban buildings, such as shadows, noise, and solar potential, plays a critical role in the analysis of dynamic urban phenomena. However, in dense and geographically constrained 3D urban environments, visual representations of time-varying building data often suffer from occlusion and visual clutter. To address these two challenges, we introduce an immersive lens visualization that integrates i) a view-dependent cutaway de-occlusion technique and ii) a temporal display derived from a conformal mapping algorithm. The mapping process first partitions irregular building footprints into smaller, sufficiently regular subregions that serve as structural primitives. These subregions are then seamlessly recombined to form a conformal, layered layout for our temporal lens visualization. The view-responsive cutaway is inspired by traditional architectural illustrations, preserving the overall layout of the building and its surroundings to maintain users' sense of spatial orientation. This lens design enables the occlusion-free embedding of shape-adaptive temporal displays across building facades on demand, supporting rapid time-space association for the discovery, access and interpretation of spatiotemporal urban patterns. Guided by domain and design goals, we outline the rationale behind the lens visual and interaction design choices, such as the encoding of time progression and temporal values in the conforming lens image. A controlled user study compares our approach against conventional juxtaposition and x-ray spatiotemporal designs. Results validate the usage and utility of our lens, showing that it improves task accuracy and completion time, reduces navigation effort, and increases user confidence. From these findings, we distill design recommendations and promising directions for future research on spatially-embedded lenses in 3D visualization, urban analytics, and related domains.

In Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) research, "behaviour" refers to one way robots express themselves and convey information. With the increased interest in robots in industrial, research, and domestic settings, understanding how robots behave and are perceived has become a top priority in the HRI community. Using the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC), we conducted a bibliometric analysis on 2,464 articles and proceedings about robot behaviour published from 2005 to 2025. Our analysis reveals a rapid development with a clear shift in HRI research on robot behaviour, moving from early theoretical and conceptual foundations toward more application-oriented studies, such as task analysis and navigation. Behavioural science and collaborative robotics have emerged as central research themes within this evolving landscape, with current research no longer limited to interaction methodologies but increasingly integrating other learning-based approaches to enhance user interaction experiences. Our analysis highlights that the field is characterized by strong cross-regional and institutional collaboration, with the United States serving as an international research center, and suggests future studies may include exploration into the interplay between behavioural science, human-robot collaboration, artificial intelligence, and robotic behaviours.

In Virtual Reality (VR), existing hand-scale passive interaction techniques are unsuitable for continuous large-scale renders: room-scale proxies lack portability, and wearable robotic arms are energy-intensive and induce friction. This paper presents a technique for providing wall haptics in VR which supports portable, passive, and large-scale user interactions. We propose a potential solution, PantographHaptics, a technique which uses the scaling properties of a pantograph to passively render two-degree-of-freedom body-scale surfaces to overcome the limitations present in existing methods. We demonstrate PantographHaptics through two prototypes: HapticLever, a grounded system, and Feedbackpack, a wearable device. We evaluate these prototypes with technical and user evaluations. Our 9-participant first study compares HapticLever against traditional haptic modalities, while our 7-participant second study verifies Feedbackpack's usability and interaction fidelity.

We call attention to the challenges associated with Global South women’s safety in public transportation and investigate the potential of autonomous vehicles (AVs) in providing them with greater mobility and broader opportunities. In a mixed-methods study with Bangladeshi women (n=23), we explored their safety issues, including sexual harassment and assault, to inform AV design, especially for shared rides. Our focus group findings revealed women’s distressing experiences of abuse and undertaken safety measures in public transport of Global South. We conducted co-design sessions utilizing virtual reality (VR) scenarios and investigated participants’ perceptions of potential AV designs addressing unique safety concerns and transportation challenges. Participants suggested prioritizing their own safety, achieved through design justice of equitable AV, over the current, often ineffective, retributive justice. Our work contributes to AV design, ICTD, and feminist HCI by suggesting implications for designing community-based and culturally contextual transportation infrastructure for Bangladeshi women and similar other communities.

In the emerging automated vehicle (AV)—passenger interaction domain, there is no agreed-upon set of methods to design early concepts. Non-designers may find it challenging to brainstorm interfaces for unfamiliar technology like AVs. Therefore, we explore using an immersive virtual environment to enable expert and non-expert designers to actively participate in the design phases. We built AV-Sketch, an in-situ (on-site) simulator that allows the creation of automotive interfaces while being immersed in VR depicting diverse AV-passenger interactions. At first, we conducted a participatory design study (N=15) by utilizing PICTIVE (Plastic Interface for Collaborative Technology) to conceptualize human-machine interfaces for AV passengers. The findings led to the design of AV-Sketch, which we tested in a design session (N=10), assessing users’ design experiences. Overall, participants felt more engaged and confident with the in-situ experience, enabling better contextualization of design ideas in real-world scenarios, with improved spatial considerations and dynamic aspects of in-vehicle interfaces.

With the introduction of autonomous vehicles (AVs) in real-world traffic, there are several human-computer interactions (HCI) challenges—especially how a passenger might interact with an AV where the human driver is absent. Riding inside an AV could be more challenging for older adults who are expected to be one of the largest user cohorts of AV. In this work, we conducted an interview session with senior participants (N=10) which allowed us to identify specific design needs for elderly passengers to have reliable communication with AVs. Based on the findings, we implemented five proof-of-concept prototypes in virtual reality (VR) and evaluated them through a user study with another group of elderly participants (N=15). Informed by the outcome, we discuss design insights for implementing inclusive interfaces inside the AVs that will be supportive of the functional abilities and cognitive needs of older adults to increase psychological driving comfort and perceived safety.

Contemporary performance artists use Virtual Reality (VR) tools to create immersive narratives and extend the boundaries of traditional performance mediums. As the medium evolves, performance practice is changing with it. Our work explores ways to leverage VR to support the creative process by introducing the Virtual Rehearsal Suite (VRS) that provides users with the experience of a large-scale rehearsal or performance environment while occupying limited physical space and minimal real-world obstructions. In this paper, we discuss findings from scene study experiments conducted within the VRS. In addition, we contribute our thresholding protocols a framework designed to support user transitions into and out of VR experiences. Our integrated approach to digital performance practice and creative collaboration combines traditional and contemporary acting techniques with HCI research to harness the innovative capabilities of virtual reality technologies creating accessible, immersive experiences for actors while facilitating user presence through state change protocols.

Recent technological innovations have led to an increase in the availability of 3D urban data, such as shadow, noise, solar potential, and earthquake simulations. These spatiotemporal datasets create opportunities for new visualizations to engage experts from different domains to study the dynamic behavior of urban spaces in this under explored dimension. However, designing 3D spatiotemporal urban visualizations is challenging, as it requires visual strategies to support analysis of time-varying data referent to the city geometry. Although different visual strategies have been used in 3D urban visual analytics, the question of how effective these visual designs are at supporting spatiotemporal analysis on building surfaces remains open. To investigate this, in this paper we first contribute a series of analytical tasks elicited after interviews with practitioners from three urban domains. We also contribute a quantitative user study comparing the effectiveness of four representative visual designs used to visualize 3D spatiotemporal urban data: spatial juxtaposition, temporal juxtaposition, linked view, and embedded view. Participants performed a series of tasks that required them to identify extreme values on building surfaces over time. Tasks varied in granularity for both space and time dimensions. Our results demonstrate that participants were more accurate using plot-based visualizations (linked view, embedded view) but faster using color-coded visualizations (spatial juxtaposition, temporal juxtaposition). Our results also show that, with increasing task complexity, plot-based visualizations perform better in preserving efficiency (time, accuracy) compared to color-coded visualizations. Based on our findings, we present a set of takeaways with design recommendations for 3D spatiotemporal urban visualizations for researchers and practitioners. Lastly, we report on a series of interviews with four practitioners, and their feedback and suggestions for further work on the visualizations to support 3D spatiotemporal urban data analysis.

In the near future, mixed traffic consisting of manual and autonomous vehicles (AVs) will be common. Questions surrounding how vulnerable road users such as pedestrians in wheelchairs (PWs) will make crossing decisions in these new situations are underexplored. We conducted a remote co-design study with one of the researchers of this work who has the lived experience as a powered wheelchair user and applied inclusive design practices. This allowed us to identify and reflect on interface design ideas that can help PWs make safe crossing decisions at intersections. Through an iterative five-week study, we implemented interfaces that can be placed on the vehicle, on the wheelchair, and on the street infrastructure and evaluated them during the co-design sessions using a VR simulator testbed. Informed by our findings, we discuss design insights for implementing inclusive interfaces to improve interactions between autonomous vehicles and vulnerable road users.

We present an autobiographical design journey exploring the experience of returning to long-term single player games. Continuing progress from a previously saved game, particularly when substantial time has passed, is an understudied area in games research. To begin our exploration in this domain, we investigated what the return experience is like first-hand. By returning to four long-term single player games played extensively in the past, we revealed a phenomenon we call The Pivot Point, a ‘eureka’ moment in return gameplay. The pivot point anchors our design explorations, where we created prototypes to leverage the pivot point in reconnecting with the experience. These return experiences and subsequent prototyping iterations inform our understanding of how to design better returns to gameplay, which can benefit both producers and consumers of long-term single player games.

BreachMob is a virtual reality (VR) tool that applies open design principles from information security to physical buildings and structures. BreachMob uses a detailed 3D digital model of a property owner's building. The model is then published as a virtual environment (VE), complete with all applicable security measures and released to the public to test the building's security and find any potential vulnerabilities by completing specified objectives. Our paper contributes a new method of applying VR to crowd source detection of physical environment vulnerabilities. We detail the technical realization of two BreachMob prototypes (a home and an airport) reflecting on static and dynamic vulnerabilities. Our design critique suggests that BreachMob promotes user immersion by allowing participants the freedom to behave in ways that align with the experience of breaching physical security protocols.

Our work extends contemporary research into visualizations and related applications for automobiles. Focusing on external car bodies as a design space we introduce the External Automotive Displays (EADs), to provide visualizations that can share context and user-specific information as well as offer opportunities for direct and mediated interaction between users and automobiles. We conducted a design study with interaction designers to explore design opportunities on EADs to provide services to different road users; pedestrians, passengers, and drivers of other vehicles. Based on the design study, we prototyped four EADs in virtual reality (VR) to demonstrate the potential of our approach. This paper contributes our vision for EADs, the design and VR implementation of a few EAD prototypes, a preliminary design critique of the prototypes, and a discussion of the possible impact and future usage of external automotive displays.

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) will redefine interactions between road users. Presently, cyclists and drivers communicate through implicit cues (vehicle motion) and explicit but imprecise signals (hand gestures, horns). Future AVs could consistently communicate awareness and intent and other feedback to cyclists based on their sensor data. We present an exploration of AV-cyclist interaction, starting with preliminary design studies which informed the implementation of an immersive VR AV-cyclist simulator, and the design and evaluation of a number of AV-cyclist interfaces. Our findings suggest that AV-cyclist interfaces can improve rider confidence in lane merging scenarios. We contribute an AV-cyclist immersive simulator, insights on trade-offs of various aspects of AV-cyclist interaction design including modalities, location, and complexity, and positive results suggesting improved rider confidence due to AV-cyclist interaction. While we are encouraged by the potential positive impact AV-cyclist interfaces can have on cyclist culture, we also emphasize the risks over-reliance can pose to cyclists.

AV-pedestrian interaction will impact pedestrian safety, etiquette, and overall acceptance of AV technology. Evaluating AV-pedestrian interaction is challenging given limited availability of AVs and safety concerns. These challenges are compounded by "mixed traffic" conditions: studying AV-pedestrian interaction will be difficult in traffic consisting of vehicles varying in autonomy level. We propose immersive pedestrian simulators as design tools to study AV-pedestrian interaction, allowing rapid prototyping and evaluation of future AV-pedestrian interfaces. We present OnFoot: a VR-based simulator that immerses participants in mixed traffic conditions and allows examination of their behavior while controlling vehicles' autonomy-level, traffic and street characteristics, behavior of other virtual pedestrians, and integration of novel AV-pedestrian interfaces. We validated OnFoot against prior simulators and Wizard-of-Oz studies, and conducted a user study, manipulating vehicles' autonomy level, interfaces, and pedestrian group behavior. Our findings highlight the potential to use VR simulators as powerful tools for AV-pedestrian interaction design in mixed traffic.

We present Mutation: performing arts based approach that can help decrease the cognitive load associated with cyborg transitioning. Cyborgs are human-machine hybrids with organic and mechatronic body parts that can be implanted or worn. The transition into and out of experiencing additional body parts is not fully understood. Our goal is to draw from performing arts techniques in order to help decrease the cognitive load associated with becoming and unbecoming a cyborg. Actors constantly shift between states, whether from one character to another, or from pre- to post- performance. We contribute a straightforward adaptation of classic performing art practices to cyborg transitioning, and a study where actors used these protocols in order to enter a cyborg state, perform as a cyborg, and then exit the cyborg state. Our work on Mutation suggests that classic performing art practices can be useful in cyborg transitioning, as well as in other technology augmented experiences.

Remote collaborators working together on physical objects have difficulty building a shared understanding of what each person is talking about. Conventional video chat systems are insufficient for many situations because they present a single view of the object in a flattened image. To understand how this limited perspective affects collaboration, we designed the Remote Manipulator (ReMa), which can reproduce orientation manipulations on a proxy object at a remote site. We conducted two studies with ReMa, with two main findings. First, a shared perspective is more effective and preferred compared to the opposing perspective offered by conventional video chat systems. Second, the physical proxy and video chat complement one another in a combined system: people used the physical proxy to understand objects, and used video chat to perform gestures and confirm remote actions.

Drivers use nonverbal cues such as vehicle speed, eye gaze, and hand gestures to communicate awareness and intent to pedestrians. Conversely, in autonomous vehicles, drivers can be distracted or absent, leaving pedestrians to infer awareness and intent from the vehicle alone. In this paper, we investigate the usefulness of interfaces (beyond vehicle movement) that explicitly communicate awareness and intent of autonomous vehicles to pedestrians, focusing on crosswalk scenarios. We conducted a preliminary study to gain insight on designing interfaces that communicate autonomous vehicle awareness and intent to pedestrians. Based on study outcomes, we developed four prototype interfaces and deployed them in studies involving a Segway and a car. We found interfaces communicating vehicle awareness and intent: (1) can help pedestrians attempting to cross; (2) are not limited to the vehicle and can exist in the environment; and (3) should use a combination of modalities such as visual, auditory, and physical.

Do-it-yourself (DIY) inspired activities have gained popularity as a means of creative expression and self-directed learning. However, DIY culture is difficult to implement in places with limited technology infrastructure and traditional learning cultures. Our goal is to understand how learners in such a setting react to DIY activities. We present observations from a physical computing workshop with 12 students (13-15 years old) conducted at a high school in India. We observed unique challenges for these students when tackling DIY activities: a high monetary and psychological cost to exploration, limited independent learning resources, difficulties with finding intellectual courage and assumed technical language proficiency. Our participants, however, overcome some of these challenges by adopting their own local strategies: resilience, nonverbal and verbal learning techniques, and creating documentation and fallback circuit versions. Based on our findings, we discuss a set of lessons learned about makerspaces in a context with socio-technical challenges.

We are interested in the interactive aspects of deploying humanoid robots as instructors for industrial assembly tasks. Training for industrial assembly requires workers to become familiar with all steps of the assembly process, including learning and reproducing new tasks, before they can be employed in a production line. The derived challenges in current practice are limited availability of skilled instructors, and the need for attention to specific workers' training needs. In this paper, we propose the use of humanoid robots in teaching assembly tasks to workers while also providing a quality learning experience. We offer an assembly robotic instructor prototype based on a Baxter humanoid, and the results of a study conducted with the prototype teaching the assembly of a simple gearbox.

Individuals can easily change interaction roles during everyday tasks, for example by shifting from following someone's lead, to leading the task themselves. We are interested in how these existing social experiences scale to human-robot interaction (HRI). How would robots change their interaction roles when working with people? Would changes in interaction roles pose a challenge unique to robots? In this paper, we propose a testbed for changing interaction roles in HRI based on a drama exercise known as the Mirror Game. The Mirror Game enables close collaboration between two individuals with each closely following the other's movements. Utilizing the Mirror Game with a large humanoid robot allowed us to examine people's reactions to changes in the humanoid interaction roles. We contribute: 1) the design of a human-robot interaction role-switching testbed based on the Mirror Game 2) a prototype of our testbed realized with Rethink Robotic's humanoid, Baxter, and 3) the results of a preliminary study examining people's reactions to the robot changing interaction roles to verify the design of the testbed.

People are increasingly using mobile video to communicate, collaborate, and share experiences while on the go. Yet this presents challenges in adequately sharing camera views with remote users. In this paper, we study the use of semi-autonomous drones for video conferencing, where an outdoor user (using a smartphone) is connected to a desktop user who can explore the environment from the drone's perspective. We describe findings from a study where pairs collaborated to complete shared navigation and search tasks. We illustrate the benefits of providing the desktop user with a view that is elevated, manipulable, and decoupled from the outdoor user. In addition, we articulate how participants overcame challenges in communicating environmental information and navigational cues, negotiated control of the view, and used the drone as a tool for sharing experiences. This provides a new way of thinking about mobile video conferencing where cameras that are decoupled from both users play an integral role in communication, collaboration, and sharing experiences.

Wall displays almost universally assume a mostly flat and static shape. We ask two questions: Would people choose a flat display for a given interaction scenario and, if not, what are the display shapes they actually prefer? We conducted a design study around these two questions. Our results show that participants designed different screen shapes that varied based upon peoples' distance from the display and the content shown. Shapes ranged primarily between flat, separated, concave, L-shape and convex displays. Based on our findings, we designed a dynamic display that changes to these and other configurations. Shape-shifting is controlled either by explicit interaction (where the display responds to hand gestures) or implicitly (where the display infers a shape based both on its content and the sensed positions of the people around it). Overall, we contribute: a study that motivates research on shape-shifting wall displays, and a shape-shifting display system that responds to explicit and implicit controls to match particular activities.

We present the results of a pilot study that investigates if and how people judge the trustworthiness of a robot during social Human-Robot Interaction (sHRI). Current research in sHRI has observed that people tend to interact with robots socially. However, results from neuroscience suggests people use different cognitive mechanisms interacting with robots than they do with humans, leading to a debate about whether people truly perceive robots as social entities. Our paper focuses on one aspect of this debate, by examining trustworthiness between people and robots using behavioral economics' ‘Trust Game’ scenario. Our pilot study replicates a trust game scenario, where a person invests money with a robot trustee in hopes they will receive a larger sum (trusting the robot to give more back), then gets a chance to invest once more. Our qualitative analysis of investing behavior and interviews with participants suggests that people may follow a human-robot (h-r) trust model that is quite similar to the human-human trust model. Our results also suggest a possible resolution to the sHRI and Neuroscience debate: people try to interact socially with robots, but due to lack of common social cues, they draw from social experience, or create new experiences by actively exploring the robot behavior.

This paper presents a set of lessons learnt from introducing maker culture and DIY paradigms to 'at-risk' students (age 12-14). Our goal is to engage 'at-risk' students through maker culture activities. While improved technology literacy is one of the outcomes we also wanted the learners to use technology to realize concepts and ideas, and to gain freedom of thinking similar to creators, artists and designers. We present our study and a set of high level suggestions to enable thinking about how maker culture activities can facilitate engagement and creative use of technology by 1) thinking about creativity in task, 2) facilitating different entry points, 3) the importance of personal relevance, and 4) relevance to education.

We are interested in the social implications of working alongside robots. In this paper we look at a humanoid robot quality inspector, acting alongside workers in an assembly line. This setting is viable in small scale assembly lines where human assembly workers provide flexible, rapid assembly. A robotic quality inspector could enhance the quality assurance process, but places the robot in a position of relative seniority to the assembly workers. We present the results of an initial in-lab pilot study designed with our industry collaborators. In our pilot, a humanoid robot visually inspected participants' assembled products in a shared workspace and provided critiques that follow simple models of robotic social feedback. Our findings suggest that people's opinions of the robot (trust, impression of intelligence, etc.) changed based on the robot's social behaviors while it is judging the participant's work. Additionally, people rated the robot more negatively if they disagreed with the robot's opinions of their work, regardless of the robot social behavior and the value of its critique.

We present Flying Frustum, a 3D spatial interface that enables control of semi-autonomous UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) using pen interaction on a physical model of the terrain, and that spatially situates the information streaming from the UAVs onto the physical model. Our interface is based on a 3D printout of the terrain, which allows the operator to enter goals and paths to the UAV by drawing them directly on the physical model. In turn, the UAV's streaming reconnaissance information is superimposed on the 3D printout as a view frustum, which is situated according to the UAV's position and orientation on the actual terrain. We argue that Flying Frustum's 3D spatially situated interaction can potentially help improve human-UAV awareness and enhance the overall situational awareness. We motivate our design approach for Flying Frustum, discuss previous related work in CSCW and HRI, present our preliminary prototype using both handheld and headset augmented reality interfaces, reflect on Flying Frustum's strengths and weaknesses, and discuss our plans for future evaluation and prototype improvements.

This work proposes the concept of shared presence, where we enable a user to "become" a co-located humanoid robot while still being able to use their real body to complete tasks. The user controls the robot and sees with its vision and sensors, while still maintaining awareness and use of their real body for tasks other than controlling the robot. This shared presence can be used to accomplish tasks that are difficult for one person alone, for example, a robot manipulating a circuit board for easier soldering by the user, lifting and manipulating heavy or unwieldy objects together, or generally having the robot conduct and complete secondary tasks while the user focuses on the primary tasks. If people are able to overcome the cognitive difficulty of maintaining presence for both themselves and a nearby remote entity, tasks that typically require the use of two people could simply require one person assisted by a humanoid robot that they control. In this work, we explore some of the challenges of creating such a system, propose research questions for shared presence, and present our initial implementation that can enable shared presence. We believe shared presence opens up a new research direction that can be applied to many fields, including manufacturing, home-assistant robotics, and education.

We designed and operationalized a greetings model for human robot interaction as a state machine, derived from a subset of social behaviors as detailed by Kendon's observations of greetings and augmented by Hall's proxemics theory. Our premise is that designing robot greetings on the social science of human greetings will make the robot's greeting actions socially understandable. Specifically, we track the location and orientation of a Nao humanoid robot relative to a person, and programmed the robot via state transitions to engage in a distance salutation, approach, close salutation and transition as described by theory. Overall, our design appears effective in simulating social intelligence during greetings.

Transparent displays can serve as an important collaborative medium supporting face-to-face interactions over a shared visual work surface. Such displays enhance workspace awareness: when a person is working on one side of a transparent display, the person on the other side can see the other's body, hand gestures, gaze and what he or she is actually manipulating on the shared screen. Even so, we argue that designing such transparent displays must go beyond current offerings if it is to support collaboration. First, both sides of the display must accept interactive input, preferably by at least touch and / or pen, as that affords the ability for either person to directly interact with the workspace items. Second, and more controversially, both sides of the display must be able to present different content, albeit selectively. Third (and related to the second point), because screen contents and lighting can partially obscure what can be seen through the surface, the display should visually enhance the actions of the person on the other side to better support workspace awareness. We describe our prototype FACINGBOARD-2 system, where we concentrate on how its design supports these three collaborative requirements.

We believe that every physical entity has a set of attributes that defines the degree of how creatively it can be used. For example, the affordances, abstractness and modular nature of Lego™ blocks allows them to take on different forms of expression that showcases varying levels of human creativity (e.g. building alphabets, creating homes etc.). Similarly, when a DIY designer uses bottles to build houses, it projects his creative skills, but at the same time it speaks about the materiality, affordances and embodiment of the bottle which lends itself readily to creative and novel interaction design efforts. This theory, that every entity has a set of attributes that allows them to lend themselves more or less readily to creative and novel interactive design explorations is what we call explorances and is the focus of our proposed work.

We present our study of Calamaro: a robotic platform designed to investigate the impact of emotive motion on people, and its deployment in an extensive field study in a busy public space at the University of Calgary campus. Our paper details the design of the Calamaro robot, the field study conducted with it, including hundreds of observers and 88 participants, and our quantitative and qualitative findings. The paper provides a thorough discussion of the implications of our results on the design of robotic emotive motions, and reflections on the deployment of robotic interfaces in field studies.

In this paper, we present a view of robots as physical agents submitting to a static infrastructure, allowing a computerized static system to use the robot as a dynamic puppet, which is a social agent that can communicate on physical and social terms with its human users and visitors. We demonstrate our approach with Ningy? of the CAVE, a prototype designed to allow a virtual reality CAVE facility to introduce its capabilities to human users and visitors. Through the robot, the CAVE is able to highlight capabilities and uses of the facility through performance, showmanship and physical actions to create an engaging interaction that conveys an overview of the facility and demonstrates its key functionalities. We examine the quality of the resulting engagement with preliminary reflection by several human visitors to our CAVE system. We believe that viewing robots as components of a greater and more capable computerized ecosystem is a less explored research path in social human-robot interaction, and hope that our Ningy? of the CAVE prototype could set the stage and inform some of the future research on this topic.

We present a series of projects for end-user authoring of interactive robotic behaviors, with a particular focus on the style of those behaviors: we call this approach Style-by-Demonstration (SBD). We provide an overview introduction of three different SBD platforms: SBD for animated character interactive locomotion paths, SBD for interactive robot locomotion paths, and SBD for interactive robot dance. The primary contribution of this article is a detailed cross-project SBD analysis of the interaction designs and evaluation approaches employed, with the goal of providing general guidelines stemming from our experiences, for both developing and evaluating SBD systems. In addition, we provide the first full account of our Puppet Master SBD algorithm, with an explanation of how it evolved through the projects.

In this article we present a multipart formal design and evaluation of the style-by-demonstration (SBD) approach to creating interactive robot behaviors: enabling people to design the style of interactive robot behaviors by providing an exemplar. We first introduce our Puppet Master SBD algorithm that enables the creation of interactive robot behaviors with a focus on style: Users provide an example demonstration of human–robot interaction and Puppet Master uses this to generate real-time interactive robot output that matches the demonstrated style. We further designed and implemented original interfaces for demonstrating interactive robot style and for interacting with the resulting robot behaviors. Following, we detail a set of studies we performed to appraise users' reactions to and acceptance of the SBD interaction design approach, the effectiveness of the underlying Puppet Master algorithm, and the usability of the demonstration interfaces. Fundamentally, this article investigates the broad questions of how people respond to SBD interaction, how they engage SBD interfaces, how SBD can be practically realized, and how the SBD approach to social human–robot interaction can be employed in future interaction design.

In this paper we present a novel mixed reality tracking system for collaborative tabletop applications that uses decorative markers and embedded application markers to create a continuous and seamless tracking space for mobile devices. Users can view and interact with mixed reality datasets on their mobile device, such as a tablet or smartphone, from distances both far and very near to the tabletop. We implement the tracking system in the context of a collaborative reservoir engineering tool that brings together many experts who need a private workspace to interact with unique datasets, which is supported by our system.

The style in which a robot moves, expressed through its gait or locomotion, can convey effective messages to people. For example, a robot could move aggressively in reaction to a person's actions, or alternatively react using a set of careful, submissive movements. Designing, implementing and programming robotic interfaces that react to users' actions with properly styled movements can be a difficult, daunting, and time consuming technical task. On the other hand, most people can easily perform such stylistic tasks and movements, for example, through acting them out.

Exercise is vital to maintaining good health, but many people neglect to work out regularly or often enough. One reason is the lack of will to take part in physical activities. We believe that interactive technologies can play a role in providing entertaining and implicitly educational mechanisms that will help people pursue healthy physical activities. As an example to our approach we present a mixed reality pet, Mootchi, which will provide users with an emotional incentive for exercising, indirectly acting as a persuasive physical trainer. This short paper outlines our prototype implementation and initial findings based on a design critique of Mootchi.

We present our exploration of the emotional impact that abstract robot motion has on human-robot interaction (HRI). We argue for the importance of designing for the fundamental characteristics of physical robot motion as distinct from designing the robot's visual appearance or functional context. We discuss our design approach, the creation of an abstract robotic motion platform that is nearly formless and affordance-less, and our evaluation of the affect abstract motion had on more than thirty participants which interacted with our robotic platform in a series of studies. We detail our results and explain how different styles of robot motion were mapped to emotional responses in human observers. We believe that our findings can inform and provide important insight into the purposeful use of motion as a design tool in social human-robot interaction.

We introduce a socially motivated interaction technique with collocated flying robots (a quadrotor in our current prototype). Instead of the traditional remote interaction controllers often used when interacting with flying robots and UAVs, we explore the collocated interaction space and suggest a direct interaction technique motivated by social human-robot interaction themes. Our approach is inspired by the types of interaction humans have with birds, specifically falconeering, and is facilitated by gestures-based interaction, while the user is within the field of view of the flying robot. This paper outlines our research goals, task examples, and our overall design approach. The paper also discusses our current prototyping efforts, as well as a preliminary evaluation of our approach, performed through two design critiques, studying our collocated interaction technique concept, and its potential, drawbacks and benefits for users.

Designing robotic behaviours capable of initiating an interruption will be extremely important as robots increasingly interact with people. Consequently, we explore the social impact of a minimal set of physical nonverbal cues that can be exhibited by a robot to initiate robot-human interruption: (a) speed of motion, (b) gaze, (c) head movement, d) rotation and (e) proximity to the person. We present two related studies evaluating this set. First, for requirements gathering, we observed the behaviour of interruption between humans, with a human actor attempting to interrupt other humans while being constrained to use only a set of behavioural cues that could be mimicked by a simple nonverbal robot. Next, we programmed a robot to exhibit similar social physical nonverbal cues, and tested their feasibility in a user study of robotic nonverbal interruption across interruption scenarios. Our results show that people were able to interpret interruption urgency from robot behaviour using only minimal nonverbal behavioural cues. These findings contribute to informing future designs of social human-robot interfaces.

Human-robot interaction (HRI) tasks in everyday environments will require people to direct or lead a robot as they walk in close proximity to it. Tasks that exemplify this interaction include a robotic porter, carrying heavy suitcases, or a robot carrying groceries. As many users may not be robotics experts, we argue that such interaction schemes must be accessible, easy to use and understand. In this paper, we present a dog-leash interface that enables a person to lead a robot simply by holding the leash, following a dog-leash interaction metaphor. We introduce variants on dog-leash robotic interaction, present our original interface implementation, and detail our formal qualitative evaluation, exploring how users perceive and accept the dog leash robotic interaction.

In this paper, we present our research efforts in exploring the role of motion and actuation in human-robot interaction. We define Emotive Actuation, and briefly discuss its function and importance in social robotic interaction. We propose a suggested methodology for exploring Emotive Actuation in HRI, and present a robotic testbed we designed for this purpose. We conclude with informal results of a preliminary design critique we performed using our testbed.

We are interested in exploring how robots controlled using Wizard of Oz (WoO) should interrupt humans in various social settings. While there is considerable work on interruption and interruptibility in HCI, little has been done to explore how these concepts will map robotic interaction. As part of our efforts to investigate interruption and interruptibility in HRI we used WoO-based methodology to investigate robot behaviours in a simple interruption scenario. In this report we contribute a design critique that discusses this methodology, and common concerns that could be generalized to other social HRI experiments as well as reflections on our future interruption HRI research.

Robots are poised to enter our everyday environments such as our homes and offices, contexts that present unique questions such as the style of the robot's actions. Style-oriented characteristics are difficult to define programmatically, a problem that is particularly prominent for a robot's interactive behaviors, those that must react accordingly to dynamic actions of people. In this paper, we present a technique for programming the style of how a robot should follow a person by demonstration, such that non-technical designers and users can directly create the style of following using their existing skill sets. We envision that simple physical interfaces like ours can be used by non-technical people to design the style of a wide range of robotic behaviors.

Interaction with a remote team of robots in real time is a difficult human-robot interaction (HRI) problem exacerbated by the complications of unpredictable real-world environments, with solutions often resorting to a larger-than-desirable ratio of operators to robots. We present two innovative interfaces that allow a single operator to interact with a group of remote robots. Using a tabletop computer the user can configure and manipulate groups of robots directly by either using their fingers (touch) or by manipulating a set of physical toys (tangible user interfaces). We recruited participants to partake in a user study that required them to interact with a small group of remote robots in simple tasks, and present our findings as a set of design considerations.

Computation is increasingly prevalent in the home: it serves as a way to control the home itself, or it is part of the many digital appliances within it. The question is: how can home inhabitants effectively understand and control the digital home? Our solution lets a person examine and control their home surroundings through a mobile display that serves as a 'magic lens', where the detail shown varies with proximity. In particular, HomeWindow is an augmented reality system that superimposes an interactive graphical interface atop of physical but digital artifacts in the home. One can get an overview of a room's computational state by looking through the display: the basic state of all digital hot spots are shown atop their physical counterparts. As one approaches a particular digital spot, more detailed information as well as a control interface is shown using a semantic zoom. Our current implementation works with two home devices. First, people can examine and remotely control the status of mobile domestic robots. Second, people can discover the power consumption of household appliances, where appliances are surrounded by a colorful aura that reflects its current and historical energy use.

An ongoing issue in human robot interaction (HRI) is how people and robots communicate with one another. While there is considerable work in real-time human-robot communication, fairly little has been done in asynchronous realm. Our approach, which we call situated messages, lets humans and robots asynchronously exchange information by placing physical tokens - each representing a simple message - in meaningful physical locations of their shared environment. Using knowledge of the robot's routines, a person can place a message token at a location, where the location is typically relevant to redirecting the robot's behavior at that location. When the robot passes nearby that location, it detects the message and reacts accordingly. Similarly, robots can themselves place tokens at specific locations for people to read. Thus situated messages leverages embodied interaction, where token placement exploits the everyday practices and routines of both people and robots. We describe our working prototype, introduce application scenarios, explore message categories and usage patterns, and suggest future directions.

Several emerging computer devices read bio-electrical signals (e.g., electro-corticographic signals, skin biopotential or facial muscle tension) and translate them into computer- understandable input. We investigated how one low-cost commercially-available device could be used to control a domestic robot. First, we used the device to issue direct motion commands; while we could control the device somewhat, it proved difficult to do reliably. Second, we interpreted one class of signals as suggestive of emotional stress, and used that as an emotional parameter to influence (but not directly control) robot behaviour. In this case, the robot would react to human stress by staying out of the person's way. Our work suggests that affecting behaviour may be a reasonable way to leverage such devices.

In this paper we suggest the use of tangible user interfaces (TUIs) for human-robot interaction (HRI) applications. We discuss the potential benefits of this approach while focusing on low-level of autonomy tasks. We present an experimental robotic interaction test bed to support our investigation. We use the test bed to explore two HRI-related task-sets: robotic navigation control and robotic posture control. We discuss the implementation of these two task-sets using an AIBO" robot dog. Both tasks were mapped to two different robotic control interfaces: keypad interface which resembles the interaction approach currently common in HRI, and a gesture input mechanism based on Nintendo Wii" game controllers. We discuss the interfaces implementation and conclude with a detailed user study for evaluating these different HRI techniques in the two robotic tasks-sets.

We describe a new method for controlling a group of robots in three-dimensional (3D) space using a tangible user interface called the 3D Tractus. Our interface maps the task space into an interactive 3D space, allowing a single user to intuitively monitor and control a group of robots. We present the use of the interface in controlling a group of virtual software bots and a physical Sony AIBO robot dog in an urban search and rescue environment involving a bomb hidden inside of a building. We also describe a comparative user study we performed where participants were asked to use both the 3D physical interface and a traditional 2D graphical user interface in order to try and demonstrate the benefits and drawbacks of each approach for HRI tasks.

This paper describes, Napkin Sketch, a 3D sketching interface which attempts to support sketch-based artistic expression in 3D, mimicking some of the qualities of conventional sketching media and tools both in terms of physical properties and interaction experience. A portable tablet PC is used as the sketching platform, and handheld mixed reality techniques are employed to allow 3D sketches to be created on top of a physical napkin. Intuitive manipulation and navigation within the 3D design space is achieved by visually tracking the tablet PC with a camera and mixed reality markers. For artistic expression using sketch input, we improve upon the projective 3D sketching approach with a one stroke sketch plane definition technique. This coupled with the hardware setup produces a natural and fluid sketching experience.

We present a new technique for human-robot interaction called robot expressionism through cartooning. We suggest that robots utilise cartoon-art techniques such as simplified and exaggerated facial expressions, stylised text, and icons for intuitive social interaction with humans. We discuss practical mixed reality solutions that allow robots to augment themselves or their surroundings with cartoon art content. Our effort is part of what we call robot expressionism, a conceptual approach to the design and analysis of robotic interfaces that focuses on providing intuitive insight into robotic states as well as the artistic quality of interaction. Our paper discusses a variety of ways that allow robots to use cartoon art and details a test bed design, implementation, and exploratory evaluation. We describe our test bed, Jeeves, which uses a Roomba, an iRobot vacuum cleaner robot, and a mixed-reality system as a platform for rapid prototyping of cartoon-art interfaces. Finally, we present a set of interaction content scenarios which use the Jeeves prototype: trash Roomba, the recycle police, and clean tracks, as well as initial exploratory evaluation of our approach.

In this paper, we describe BuildBot, a robotic interface developed to assist with the continuous integration process utilized by co-located agile software development teams. BuildBot's physical nature allows us to engage the agile software development team members through vision, hearing and touch. In this way, BuildBot becomes an active part of the development process by bringing together human-robot interaction, human group dynamics and software engineering concepts through a number of interaction modalities. In this paper we describe the design and implementation of the BuildBot prototype, a robotic interface that can sense virtual stimuli, in this case the state of a software build, and react accordingly in a physical way via vision, sound and touch. We present an early evaluation comparing BuildBot to two other tools used by an agile team to monitor the continuous integration process. We also show preliminary results indicating that BuildBot may be more noticeable to the developers and contribute to a fun and lighthearted atmosphere. We argue that by increasing awareness of the state of the software build, BuildBot can assist in the self-supervision of agile software engineering teams and can help the team achieve its goals in a more engaging and sociable manner.

This paper details the design and evaluation of the Delphian Desktop, a mechanism for online spatial prediction of cursor movements in a Windows-Icons-Menus-Pointers (WIMP) environment. Interaction with WIMP-based interfaces often becomes a spatially challenging task when the physical interaction mediators are the common mouse and a high resolution, physically large display screen. These spatial challenges are especially evident in overly crowded Windows desktops. The Delphian Desktop integrates simple yet effective predictive spatial tracking and selection paradigms into ordinary WIMP environments in order to simplify and ease pointing tasks. Predictions are calculated by tracking cursor movements and estimating spatial intentions using a computationally inexpensive online algorithm based on estimating the movement direction and peak velocity. In testing the Delphian Desktop effectively shortened pointing time to faraway icons, and reduced the overall physical distance the mouse (and user hand) had to mechanically traverse.

Assessments of spatial, constructional ability are used widely in cognitive research and in clinical diagnosis of disease or injury. Some believe that three-dimensional (3D) forms of these assessments would be particularly sensitive, but difficulties with consistency in administration and scoring have limited their use. We describe Cognitive Cubes, a novel computerized tool for 3D constructional assessment that increases consistency and promises improvements in flexibility, reliability, sensitivity and control. Cognitive Cubes makes use of ActiveCube, a novel tangible user interface for describing 3D shape. In testing, Cognitive Cubes was sensitive to differences in cognitive ability and task, and correlated well to a standard paper-and-pencil 3D spatial assessment

CAVE/sup TM/ displays offer many advantages over other virtual reality (VR) displays, including a large, unencumbered viewing space. Unfortunately, the typical tracking subsystems used with CAVE/sup TM/ displays tether the user and lessen this advantage. We have designed a simple, low-cost foot tracker that is wireless, leaving the user free to move. The tracker can be assembled for less than $200 US, and achieves an accuracy of /spl plusmn/10 cm at a 20-Hz sampling rate. We have tested the prototype with two applications: a visualization supporting close visual inspection, and a walkthrough of the campus. Although the tracking was convincing, it was clear that the tracker's limitations make it less than ideal for applications requiring precise visual inspection. However the freedom of motion allowed by the tracker was a compelling supplement to our campus walkthrough, allowing users to stroll and look around corners.