Design and evaluation of a CAL system to support communication development in children with autism

The prevalence of autism in children in the United Kingdom is estimated as one in one hundred (Department of Health, 2012), with higher levels reported in some countries (Srivastava, 2013). These children experience significant problems with the development of language and communication skills. A symbol-based communication system called Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS) is widely used to address this issue and evidence indicates this approach can be effective when administered by trained professionals (Preston and Carter, 2009). Technology appears to offer an alternative way of encouraging non-verbal children with autism to use symbol-based communication to improve social interaction and communication. Therefore, the purpose of the research was to answer the following research questions: 1. Can a Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) system be designed and implemented to support PECS pedagogy for the purpose of improving symbol communication and social interaction in non-verbal children with autism? 2. To what extent could such a system improve the communication and social interaction skills of non-verbal children with autism? The investigation comprised three stages. In Stage 1, a prototype system was developed incorporating a 'virtual tutor' and an RFID-based (radio frequency identification) user interface to support physical symbol selection and placement. In Stage 2, a pilot study focused on classroom learning experiences of eight children using CAPE Version 1. Results provided ‘proof of concept’ and indicated that non-verbal children with autism learned to interact effectively with CAPE. Participants achieved more appropriate symbol selections when a virtual tutor used a synthetic voice compared to a natural voice alternative. Outcomes from the pilot informed the development of a CAPE Version 2. Stage 3 comprised a four-week classroom study involving five non-verbal children with autism. Children, using CAPE Version 2, answered numeracy questions using graphic symbols. Interviews from supporting teachers provided a degree of triangulation with investigator observations and teacher interviews. Stage 3 results suggest that four participants developed their communication skills, one child learned to count, three children improved basic numeracy skills and two children used speech using CAPE version 2, supported by a virtual tutor and a human teacher. This research suggests that non-verbal children with autism can engage positively and productively with PECS using the CAPE approach

Dynamics of Human-Robot Interaction in Domestic Environments

Domestic service robots are nowadays widely available on the consumer market. As such, robots have begun entering people’s homes and daily lives. However, it seems that the dissemination of domestic robots has not happened as easily and widespread as it was anticipated in the first place. Little is known about the reasons why because long-term studies of ordinary people using real robots in their homes are rare. To better understand how people interact, use and accept domestic robots, studies of human-robot interaction require ecologically valid settings and the user and their needs have to come into the focus. In this dissertation, we propose to investigate the dynamics of human-robot interaction in domestic environments. We first explore the field by means of a 6-month ethnographic study of nine households. We provided each of the households with a Roomba vacuum cleaning robot. Our motivation is to understand long-term acceptance and to identify factors that can promote and hinder the integration of a domestic service robot in different types of households. We would like to find out how people’s perception of the robot, and the way they interact with it and use it, evolve over time. Furthermore, as social factors were highlighted in previous studies on technology adoption in homes, we shed light on to what extent people view Roomba and other types of domestic robots as a social entity and to what extent they anthropomorphize it. Findings of this research can be used to guide the design of user-oriented robots that have the potential to lastingly become a valuable part within the home ecology. Then, we pursue the idea of developing our own domestic robot prototype that could be used in a household with children. We imagine a playful robot that aims to motivate young children to tidy up their toys. In a first evaluation of the robot in 14 family homes, we study the effect of a proactive and reactive robot behavior on children’s interaction with the robot and their motivation to tidy up. A follow-up experiment explores the possibility to sustain children’s engagement by manipulating the robot’s behavior in such way that it appears unexpected. We further investigate how far this influences children’s perception of the robot in terms of anthropomorphism. Our findings emphasize the importance of research in ecologically valid settings in order to obtain a better understanding of human-robot interaction, advance further the design of user-oriented robots and foster the long-term acceptance of these devices

Now There\u27s No Difference : Artificial Subjectivity as a Posthuman Negotiation of Hegel\u27s Master/Slave Dialectic

This thesis examines the theme of robot rebellion in SF narrative as an incarnation of Hegel’s Master/Slave dialectic. Chapter one analyzes the depiction of robot rebellion in Karel Capek’s R.U.R. Chapter two surveys posthuman theory and offers close readings of two contemporary SF television series that exemplify ontologically progressive narratives. The thesis concludes that posthuman subjectivity sublates the Master/Slave dialectic and encourages practical posthuman ethics

Towards long-term social child-robot interaction: using multi-activity switching to engage young users

Social robots have the potential to provide support in a number of practical domains, such as learning and behaviour change. This potential is particularly relevant for children, who have proven receptive to interactions with social robots. To reach learning and therapeutic goals, a number of issues need to be investigated, notably the design of an effective child-robot interaction (cHRI) to ensure the child remains engaged in the relationship and that educational goals are met. Typically, current cHRI research experiments focus on a single type of interaction activity (e.g. a game). However, these can suffer from a lack of adaptation to the child, or from an increasingly repetitive nature of the activity and interaction. In this paper, we motivate and propose a practicable solution to this issue: an adaptive robot able to switch between multiple activities within single interactions. We describe a system that embodies this idea, and present a case study in which diabetic children collaboratively learn with the robot about various aspects of managing their condition. We demonstrate the ability of our system to induce a varied interaction and show the potential of this approach both as an educational tool and as a research method for long-term cHRI

Autonomous Corporate Personhood

Several states have recently changed their business organization law to accommodate autonomous businesses—businesses operated entirely through computer code. A variety of international civil society groups are also actively developing new frameworks— and a model law—for enabling decentralized, autonomous businesses to achieve a corporate or corporate-like status that bestows legal personhood. Meanwhile, various jurisdictions, including the European Union, have considered whether and to what extent artificial intelligence (AI) more broadly should be endowed with personhood to respond to AI’s increasing presence in society. Despite the fairly obvious overlap between the two sets of inquiries, the legal and policy discussions between the two only rarely overlap. As a result of this failure to communicate, both areas of personhood theory fail to account for the important role that socio-technical and socio-legal context plays in law and policy development. This Article fills the gap by investigating the limits of artificial rights at the intersection of corporations and artificial intelligence. Specifically, this Article argues that building a comprehensive legal approach to artificial rights—rights enjoyed by artificial people, whether corporate entity, machine, or otherwise—requires approaching the issue through a systems lens to ensure that the legal system adequately considers the varied socio-technical contexts in which artificial people exist. To make these claims, this Article begins by establishing a terminology baseline, and emphasizing the importance of viewing AI as part of a socio-technical system. Part I then concludes by reviewing the existing ecosystem of autonomous corporations. Parts II and III then examine the existing debates around artificially intelligent persons and corporate personhood, arguing that the socio-legal needs driving artificial personhood debates in both contexts include: protecting the rights of natural people, upholding social values, and creating a fiction for legal convenience. Parts II and III also explore the extent to which the theories from either set of literature fits the reality of autonomous businesses, illuminating gaps and using them to demonstrate that the law must consider the socio-technical context of AI systems and the socio-legal complexity of corporations to decide how autonomous businesses will interact with the world. Ultimately, the Article identifies and leverages links between both areas of legal personhood to demonstrate the Article’s core claim: developing law for artificial systems in any context should use the systems nature of the technical artifact to tie its legal treatment directly to the system’s socio-technical reality

Artificial intelligence and human values

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is increasingly used in daily life. Where once decisions and choices were left to human management, technology now plays a much more incisive role. This topic has spawned several diverging and alarming opinions (e.g. Elon Musk and Stephen Hawkings), due to the various ethical susceptibilities that AI development spans. The present study attempts to perceive whether human values influence individuals’ attitudes towards AI evolution. This technology is exposed in several different contexts: in the chance that AI threatens each one of the values; the opposite case, where AI is beneficial; in the need (or lack thereof) for the presence of regulatory agents, and whether that changed people's initial decision. With a sample of 205 participants, and through quantitative methodology (questionnaire), as well as qualitative (semi-structured interviews), the conclusion is that equality, freedom, health and national security constitute a predictive power when it comes to the attitudes that individuals nurture towards AI evolution. More specifically, in the event that AI threatens equality, people develop unfavourable attitudes towards its evolution. The same happens for freedom, where people are also against AI evolution, whether it benefits or threatens human values. People tend to be in favour of AI evolution if it benefits health, but require the presence of regulatory agents. Lastly, the attitudes towards AI evolution are positive if it benefits national security. People still demonstrate generally positive attitudes in the event that this value is threatened by AI, but require the presence of regulatory agents.A inteligência artificial (IA) é cada vez mais utilizada na vida quotidiana, em que onde as decisões e escolhas eram deixadas à gestão humana, a tecnologia assume agora um papel mais incisivo nessa questão. Esta temática tem sido motivo para várias opiniões divergentes e alarmísticas (e.g. Elon Musk e Stephen Hawkings), devido às várias suscetibilidades éticas que o desenvolvimento da IA abarca. O presente estudo procura percecionar se os valores humanos influenciam as atitudes que os indivíduos têm para com a evolução da IA. Esta tecnologia é exposta em vários contextos: no caso da IA ameaçar cada um dos valores; no caso oposto, de a mesma os beneficiar; na necessidade ou não da presença de agentes reguladores, e se os mesmos de alguma forma alteravam a sua decisão inicial. Com uma amostra de 205 participantes, através de uma metodologia quantitativa (questionário) e qualitativa (entrevistas semiestruturadas), concluiu-se que a igualdade, a liberdade, a saúde e a segurança nacional constituem um poder preditivo relativamente às atitudes que os indivíduos têm face à evolução da IA. Mais especificamente, se a IA ameaçar a igualdade surgem atitudes desfavoráveis à sua evolução, igualmente, no caso da liberdade as pessoas também são contra à evolução da IA, mesmo que ela beneficie ou ameace os valores humanos. A saúde se for beneficiada pela IA, a pessoas tendem a ser a favor da sua evolução, mas sempre com a presença de agentes reguladores. Por fim, se a IA beneficiar a segurança nacional, surgem atitudes positivas face à sua evolução, bem como, se a IA ameaçar o mesmo valor as pessoas continuam a demonstrar atitudes positivas, mas exigem a presença de agentes reguladores

Ambivalent animal

The Ambivalent Animal project explores the interactions of animals, culture and technology. The project employs both artistic practice and critical theory, each in ways that inspire the other. My creative practice centers around two projects that focus on domestic pets. These projects highlight the animal's uncertain status as they explore the overlapping ontologies of animal, human and machine. They provide concrete artifacts that engage with theoretical issues of anthropocentrism, animality and alterity. My theoretical work navigates between the fields of animal studies, art and design, media and culture studies, and philosophy. My dissertation explores animality through four real and imagined animal roles: cyborg, clone, chimera and shapeshifter. Each animal role is considered in relation to three dialectics: irreducibility and procedurality, autonomy and integration, aura and abjection. These dialectics do not seek full synthesis but instead embrace the oscillations of irresolvable debates and desires. The dialectics bring into focus issues of epistemology, ontology, corporeality and subjectivity. When the four animal roles engage the three dialectics, connected yet varied themes emerge. The cyborgian animal is simultaneously liberated and regulated, assisted and restricted, integrated and isolated. The cloned animal is an emblem of renewal and loss; she is both idealized code and material flesh and finds herself caught in the battles of nature and nurture. The chimera is both rebel and conformist; his unusual juxtapositions pioneer radical corporeal transgressions but also conform to the mechanisms of global capital. And the shapeshifter explores the thrill and anxiety of an altered phenomenology; she gains new perceptions though unstable subjectivity. These roles reveal corporeal adjustments and unfamiliar subjectivities that inspire the creative practice. Both my writing and making employ an ambivalent aesthetic--an aesthetic approach that evokes two or more incompatible sensibilities. The animal's uncertain status contributes to this aesthetic: some animals enjoy remarkable care and attention, while others are routinely exploited, abused and discarded. Ambivalence acknowledges the complexity of lived experience, philosophical and political debate, and academic inquiry. My approach recognizes the light and dark of these complex ambivalences--it privileges paradox and embraces the confusion and wonder of creative research. Rather than erase, conceal or resolve ambiguity, an ambivalent aesthetic foregrounds the limits of language and representation and highlights contradiction and irresolution.Ph.D.Committee Chair: Bolter, Jay; Committee Member: DiSalvo, Carl; Committee Member: Do, Ellen; Committee Member: Prophet, Jane; Committee Member: Thacker, Eugen