My Robot Companion

Artists Anna Dumitriu and Alex May are collaborating with Professor Kerstin Dautenhahn and Dr Michael L Walters from the Adaptive Systems Research Group to investigate their reserch into social robotics and to ask the questions, do we want and need robot companions? And, if so, what kinds of robot companions do we, as a society, want? Uses for robot companions can vary, forms currently in development worldwide include robot carers for older people, robot nannies to watch over children, sexual companions and home defence robots. Bear in mind that the word ‘robot’ derives from the Slavic word ‘robota’ meaning forced labour. Dumitriu and May’s work focusses on raising public debate around the ethical issues in contemporary robotics and led to the development of a serious of provocative heads for humanoid robots. Research shows that often people find humanoid robots appealing as companions and that the ‘head’ though technically irrelevant (sensors can be placed anywhere on a robot) acts as a focal point for users to communicate with their robot companions. The robot head shown as Kinetica Art Fair 2012 is the ultimate in personal robotics. It can take on the appearance of any user to provide a potentially comforting sense of recognition and familiarity, as can aid users in every aspect of their lives, even while they are sleeping [reminiscent of witches “familiars” from folklore]. The “Familiar” head uses a Microsoft Kinect to take features from visitors' faces and combining them with features from their friends and family’s faces based on their proximity to the robot. It looks most like the person that it sees most in order to promote bonding. As you approach, it turns to you and begins to change. The robot tells you “I like your face” or “I love you”. Of course this can also lead to a feeling of discomfort known in robotics as “the uncanny valley” (Mori, 1970), where users feel a sense of repulsion as robots become very humanlike (in this case very like themselves and their companions) but stopping short of being wholly human. The depth camera in the Kinect can be used to measure this effect in operation by recording how visitors approach the robot. The piece was originally commissioned by The Science Gallery in Dublin as part of their 2011 “Human + the future of the species” exhibition, was exhibited at “Robotville” at the Science Museum in London in 2012 and is planned to tour to other venues in 2012. The head is shown here on the “Charly” robot body, the latest humanoid robot built by the Adaptive Systems Research Group at The University of Hertfordshire as part of the LIREC project. LIREC (LIving with Robots and intEractive Companions) is a European funded (FP7) research project exploring how we can live with digital and interactive companions. The project explores how to design digital and interactive companions who can develop and read emotions. It brings together the world of ethology, social science, design & computer science to design future real world applications today. LIREC is a collaboration between six universities, two research institutes and two companies spread across 7 European countries.