CFP: Towards novel concepts of social presence for robots

Call for abstracts

Deadline Sept, 30, 2024

Workshop 

Towards novel concepts of social presence for robots

@ ICSR 2024
Odense, Denmark
October 23, 2024
Website: https://icsr2024.dk/

Organizers: Luisa Damiano, Belinda Dunstan and Rebecca Mannocci

Contact: [email protected]

Important Dates:
Abstract Due - Sept 30, 2024

Notification of acceptance – Oct 5, 2024

Workshop – Oct 23, 2024

Call for abstracts

We are interested in submissions of original HRI and Social Robotics research, or research in related fields, relevant to the topic of “Novel concepts of social presence for robots”. The submissions, in the form of an abstract (min 250, max 500 words), should be related to the investigation of one or more specific aspects of social presence of robots (e.g. theoretical, epistemological, methodological, applicative, social, anthropological, ethical aspects) within the context of HRI, Social Robotics or related fields. In particular, they should present original research works dealing with questions such as, but not limited to, the following:

-       How can we construct, for social robots, forms of presence that make them “social connectors” (Damiano, 2021), capable of facilitating, enriching, and intensifying human-to-human interactions, particularly for people with special needs?

-       Should we proceed in the direction of reproducing traits of human social presence in robots or in the direction of inventing new forms of social presence for these machines? Can evolutionary anthropology be a useful source of knowledge in this process? If yes, should we rely on the synthetic (“understanding-by-building”) method or on new, specific methodologies of inquiry?

-       How can we understand the impact that the social presence of a robot may have on human social behavior and on human value choices and conducts? How can we construct empirical studies that enable us to estimate this impact?

-       Can the diffusion of social robots be proactively directed towards the goal of creating forms of social presence for robots capable of positively transforming our sociality and why? If so, what forms of scientific exploration could support us in this undertaking?

-       What epistemological, ethical, social principles should be included in the design of next-generation social robots and human-robot (social) interactions?

About the workshop:

General topic. Acceptance and diffusion of social robots, within human everyday con- texts, are processes in which the “social presence” of such robotic agents plays a key role. Specialists in social robotics and related fields often consider this characteristic as the ability of a robot to generate, in its human users, the “feeling of being in the company of someone” (e.g., Heerink et al., 2008; Damiano, Dumouchel, 2018). Typically, the social presence of a robotic agent is construed, both at the conceptual and at the implementation level, as a combination of traits, skills or performance enabling these “social machines” to communicate with us through social signals compatible with ours – i.e., a wide variety of social signals, ranging from gestures to emotional expressions. This workshop aims to explore whether and how the notion of the social presence of robots can be further articulated and enhanced in order to facilitate, on one side, the acceptance and inclusion, in human social contexts, of this new class of artificial social actors, and, on the other side, a form of social co-evolution with these machines capable of supporting positive human self-development. 

Objectives. The workshop aims to provide an interdisciplinary forum in which researchers in social robotics and related disciplinary areas can propose, investigate and discuss new trajectories for the development of the above-mentioned notion of social presence for robotic agents, with a particular attention towards the potential that these novel paths can express regarding the general objective of a positive human self-development through technology. The main goal of our workshop is twofold. 

Firstly, we intend to consider and critically explore cutting-edge research related to new, rich, plural notions of robotic social presence and possible ways of implementing them in social robots. Within the workshop, we aim to perform such an exploration not just from a technical, but also from theoretical, epistemological, social, and ethical point of view, in order to focus the attention of the participants on the concrete possibility of mixed human-robot ecologies in which humans co-exist with robotic agents characterized by a variety of different ways of being social, and able to stimulate human social and ethical growth. 

Secondly, we target the creation of a scientific transdisciplinary community engaged in building a roadmap for the evolution of the social presence of robots. Through this workshop we would like to gather engineers, social human-robot interaction experts, robot designers, as well as scholars in human sciences and ethics, to collaborate in designing the next generations of social robots for human social and ethical self-development. 

How to submit an abstract

If you would like to contribute to the workshop “Towards novel concepts of social presence for robots”, please send an email to [email protected] (cc: [email protected]) with:

1)    list of authors;

2)    title of the abstract;

3)    abstract (min 250, max 500 words).