A Cognitive Agent Model Using Inverse Mirroring for False Attribution of Own Actions to Other Agents

Abstract. This paper presents a cognitive agent model capable of showing situations where self-generated actions are attributed to other agents, as, for example, for patients suffering from schizophrenia. The mechanism underlying the model involves inverse mirroring: mapping preparation states onto sensory representations of observed actions. It is shown how this mechanism can develop based on Hebbian learning. The model provides a basis for applications to human-like virtual agents in the context of for example, training of therapists or agent-based generation of virtual stories

Using mixed reality displays for observational learning of motor skills: A design research approach enhancing memory recall and usability

When learning an action sequence, observing a demonstration informs the knowledge of movement execution and enhances the efficiency of motor skill acquisition. Three-dimensional (3D) virtual learning environments offer more opportunities for motor skill training as they afford observational learning. Mixed reality platforms (virtual reality, desktop PC, etc.) that render 3D virtual environments can therefore increase accessibility of observational content. To explore the effectiveness of these platforms so as to facilitate observational learning of action sequences, we developed the Recovery Position Application [1] (RPA) at the Interactive System Studio, University of Plymouth. The RPA was originally designed for mobile virtual reality. The RPA displays two virtual avatars performing the steps of the recovery position. We present the design of content and interaction informed by research into observational learning of motor skills. To formatively evaluate the current functional prototype, and potential use within an educational context, RPA was tested on three different platforms. Mobile VR (N=20), desktop PC (N=20) and video recording (N=21). Memory recall of movements was recorded and the usability of the RPA was investigated. Across all three platforms, the average recall of demonstrated information was 61.88%, after using the application for 10 min. No significant differences between recall rates were identified between platforms. Participant responses were positive or very positive for both application effectiveness as a learning resource and for ease of use. These results are discussed with regard to the future development of the RPA and guidelines for virtual demonstration content

Modeling Super Mirroring Functionality in Action Execution, Imagination, Mirroring, and Imitation

In this paper a cognitive agent model is presented that on the one hand incorporates multiple functions of preparation states such as mirroring an observed action of another agent, imitation of another agent’s action, or imagining an action, and on the other hand incorporates a super mirroring function enabling the agent to keep track of the context of a mental process such as, mirroring another agent, imitation of another agent, action imagination, or own action performance. These cognitive functions have been adopted from mirror neuron and super mirror neuron functions informally described in neurological literature and formalised in a cognitive agent model. Example simulations have been generated that illustrate its functioning, and a mathematical analysis has been made

Trust in Robots

Robots are increasingly becoming prevalent in our daily lives within our living or working spaces. We hope that robots will take up tedious, mundane or dirty chores and make our lives more comfortable, easy and enjoyable by providing companionship and care. However, robots may pose a threat to human privacy, safety and autonomy; therefore, it is necessary to have constant control over the developing technology to ensure the benevolent intentions and safety of autonomous systems. Building trust in (autonomous) robotic systems is thus necessary. The title of this book highlights this challenge: “Trust in robots—Trusting robots”. Herein, various notions and research areas associated with robots are unified. The theme “Trust in robots” addresses the development of technology that is trustworthy for users; “Trusting robots” focuses on building a trusting relationship with robots, furthering previous research. These themes and topics are at the core of the PhD program “Trust Robots” at TU Wien, Austria

Imitation learning through games: theory, implementation and evaluation

Despite a history of games-based research, academia has generally regarded commercial games as a distraction from the serious business of AI, rather than as an opportunity to leverage this existing domain to the advancement of our knowledge. Similarly, the computer game industry still relies on techniques that were developed several decades ago, and has shown little interest in adopting more progressive academic approaches. In recent times, however, these attitudes have begun to change; under- and post-graduate games development courses are increasingly common, while the industry itself is slowly but surely beginning to recognise the potential offered by modern machine-learning approaches, though games which actually implement said approaches on more than a token scale remain scarce. One area which has not yet received much attention from either academia or industry is imitation learning, which seeks to expedite the learning process by exploiting data harvested from demonstrations of a given task. While substantial work has been done in developing imitation techniques for humanoid robot movement, there has been very little exploration of the challenges posed by interactive computer games. Given that such games generally encode reasoning and decision-making behaviours which are inherently more complex and potentially more interesting than limb motion data, that they often provide inbuilt facilities for recording human play, that the generation and collection of training samples is therefore far easier than in robotics, and that many games have vast pre-existing libraries of these recorded demonstrations, it is fair to say that computer games represent an extremely fertile domain for imitation learning research. In this thesis, we argue in favour of using modern, commercial computer games to study, model and reproduce humanlike behaviour. We provide an overview of the biological and robotic imitation literature as well as the current status of game AI, highlighting techniques which may be adapted for the purposes of game-based imitation. We then proceed to describe our contributions to the field of imitation learning itself, which encompass three distinct categories: theory, implementation and evaluation. We first describe the development of a fully-featured Java API - the Quake2 Agent Simulation Environment (QASE) - designed to facilitate both research and education in imitation and general machine-learning, using the game Quake 2 as a testbed. We outline our motivation for developing QASE, discussing the shortcomings of existing APIs and the steps which we have taken to circumvent them. We describe QASE’s network layer, which acts as an interface between the local AI routines and the Quake 2 server on which the game environment is maintained, before detailing the API’s agent architecture, which includes an interface to the MatLab programming environment and the ability to parse and analyse full recordings of game sessions. We conclude the chapter with a discussion of QASE’s adoption by numerous universities as both an undergraduate teaching tool and research platform. We then proceed to describe the various imitative mechanisms which we have developed using QASE and its MatLab integration facilities. We first outline a behaviour model based on a well-known psychological model of human planning. Drawing upon previous research, we also identify a set of believability criteria - elements of agent behaviour which are of particular importance in determining the “humanness” of its in-game appearance. We then detail a reinforcement-learning approach to imitating the human player’s navigation of his environment, centred upon his pursuit of items as strategic goals. In the subsequent section, we describe the integration of this strategic system with a Bayesian mechanism for the imitation of tactical and motion-modelling behaviours. Finally, we outline a model for the imitation of reactive combat behaviours; specifically, weapon-selection and aiming. Experiments are presented in each case to demonstrate the imitative mechanisms’ ability to accurately reproduce observed behaviours. Finally, we criticise the lack of any existing methodology to formally gauge the believability of game agents, and observe that the few previous attempts have been extremely ad-hoc and informal. We therefore propose a generalised approach to such testing; the Bot-Oriented Turing Test (BOTT). This takes the form of an anonymous online questionnaire, an accompanying protocol to which examiners should adhere, and the formulation of a believability index which numerically expresses each agent’s humanness as indicated by its observers, weighted by their experience and the accuracy with which the agents were identified. To both validate the survey approach and to determine the efficacy of our imitative models, we present a series of experiments which use the believability test to evaluate our own imitation agents against both human players and traditional artificial bots. We demonstrate that our imitation agents perform substantially better than even a highly-regarded rule-based agent, and indeed approach the believability of actual human players. Some suggestions for future directions in our research, as well as a broader discussion of open questions, conclude this thesis

The corporate renewal dilemma: understanding the influence of the job construct on the resource allocation process in the retail banking industry

Tesis inédita de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Empresariales, Departamento de Organización de Empresas, leída el 07-05-2014Una de las patologías más frecuentes de las empresas modernas es conocida por el término Estancamiento. Más del 90% de las empresas lo sufrirán a lo largo de su ciclo de vida (Olson & Van Bever 2008). Esta patología consiste en una ralentización de la tasa de crecimiento orgánico, que quedará por debajo del umbral de crecimiento sostenible unida a la imposibilidad de retornar a altas tasas de crecimiento. Esta patología sucede en todas las empresas de todos los ámbitos y países. Sin embargo a pesar de haber sido objeto de estudio por parte de la comunidad científica aún nos encontramos lejos de la solución. Las investigaciones previas muestran que este es un problema complejo y cuyas implicaciones exceden el ámbito de un único campo de investigación. Por ejemplo, en la literatura de diseño organizacional existe evidencia de que mecanismos como la Inercia o las Rigideces Organizativas juegan un papel relevante en la generación del Estancamiento. En la literatura de cambio tecnológico se muestran evidencias similares con las Discontinuidades o el fenómeno de exceder las expectativas de los clientes. La literatura de marketing estratégico también muestra evidencias que la unen con este problema. Sin embargo, a pesar de la extensa literatura, cada una con sus propias conclusiones, no hay evidencias de estudios que muestren una solución clara al problema del Estancamiento. Esta tesis analiza este problema usando una metodología estructurada en dos partes. En la primera parte se utiliza una metodología que controla específicamente las variables causales y cuya unidad de análisis es el constructo “Job”, que ha sido identificado previamente en la literatura a nivel inductivo. El constructo “Job” incluye información relacionada con la industria, el diseño organizacional, el cliente y el producto. En la segunda parte se testea la influencia de la Hipótesis Espejo en la generación de Estancamiento. Posteriormente se procede a introducir el constructo “Job” y se observa si su efecto anula la influencia de la Hipótesis Espejo devolviendo a la empresa a tasas de crecimiento superiores a su crecimiento sostenible. La primera parte del estudio se elaboró con una metodología llamada Multi Método que combina datos cualitativos y cuantitativos (Tashakkori and Teddlie, 2003). Este método además controla específicamente la tipología de las variables, poniendo especial atención las que son exógenas y endógenas, inductivas y deductivas y particularmente las que son causales en relación a las que son descriptivas. En total se obtuvieron 62 variables deductivas (provenientes del cuerpo teórico) y 34 variables inductivas (que emergen a lo largo de la investigación). El estudio de campo se realizó en la industria de la banca minorista en España. La base de datos final recogió 106.452 registros. Esta riqueza de los datos permitió obtener varios constructos “Job” y compararlos en un estudio clínico. Los resultados de dicho estudio muestran que la estructura primaria descrita en la literatura se confirma y se amplía con nuevas estructuras que son completamente nuevas e inéditas en la literatura. La segunda parte del estudio se elaboró con una metodología llamada Método Mixto (Dillman, 2006; Edmondson and McManus, 2007) y sus datos provinieron de una encuesta también realizada en la industria de la banca. La encuesta obtuvo 306 registros, lo cual indica una tasa de respuesta excepcionalmente alta en esta industria. La encuesta sirvió para: 1) Triangular los resultados de la primera parte del estudio y de esta forma replicar los resultados del Multi Método; 2) Aislar la influencia de la Hipótesis Espejo en el proceso de Estagnación y; 3) Aislar la influencia del constructo “Job” en la teoría de asignación de recursos y cuál es el mecanismo por el que es capaz de generar nuevas iniciativas de alto crecimiento. En las conclusiones de esta tesis se explican las razones que causan que la Hipótesis Espejo actúe como inhibidor de las nuevas iniciativas de alto margen (actúa eliminando el Impetus). Además se concluye que mecanismos como la Inercia o las Rigideces Organizativas no son causas sino síntomas generados por la Hipótesis Espejo. Una conclusión adicional es que el constructo “Necesidad”, actualmente predominante en marketing estratégico, no contiene la información necesaria para anular el efecto de la Hipótesis Espejo ya que ésta además actúa con diferente intensidad en cada área funcional de la empresa. La tesis concluye con un experimento clínico en el que se reemplaza el constructo “Necesidad” por el constructo “Job”. Los resultados evidencian cómo la información contenida en el constructo “Job” es capaz de neutralizar la Hipótesis Espejo a través de la reasignación de recursos a las nuevas iniciativas de alto margen (actúa devolviendo el Impetus a las nuevas iniciativas del alto margen). Estas evidencias permiten concluir que el constructo “Job” es capaz de recuperar una empresa que se encuentra con un problema de Estancamiento devolviéndola a tasas de crecimiento sosteniblesOver their lifetime, more than 90% of the firms in the world will inevitably suffer from a process called Stagnation, where they will experience a substantial and abrupt growth slowdown from which they will never recover, hence never experiencing sustainable growth again (Olson & Van Bever 2008). This happens irrespective of how effective their management is, in which country they are located or the industry where they operate. Management scholars have been researching this problem for a long time, but the formula to prevent this from happening or to regain new net growth remains elusive. Previous research suggests that this challenge is very complex and that its implications remain outside of the scope of a single field of study. For instance, at the organizational level mechanisms such as Inertia, Competency Traps or Corporate Rigidities have been identified. At the technological level the role of Discontinuities, Technological Change and Overshooting have also been clearly delineated. At the Marketing level the limitations of consumer information and the foundational blocks of consumer research have also been identified. Despite this extensive literature results are not improving, it appears that even combining all these factors it’s still not enough to prevent Stagnation. This thesis tackles this challenge in a different way and using a two‐step methodology. First it uses a new methodology that specifically controls for causality while it isolates and understands the anatomy of a new corporate “cell” that has been defined previously at the inductive level in the literature and that predicts consumer behavior with a substantially higher level of accuracy. This “cell”, named the Job Construct contains multilevel information that affects the industry, the firm’s Organizational Design, the Consumer and the Product. Second we test the influence of the Mirroring Hypothesis as the causal variable that generates Competency Traps, Inertia and Corporate Rigidities. We then subsequently introduce the Job Construct in the research to clinically control for its influence and in particular for knowing if this new “cell” is capable of overcoming the influence on the Mirroring Hypothesis resulting in the re‐engagement of the firm in new net growth. Two research methodologies were used. First a Qualitative – Quantitative Sequential Multi‐Method Model (Tashakkori and Teddlie, 2003) was used to isolate and understand the anatomy of the Job Construct. This model was designed emphasizing the control of exogenous and endogenous variables, inductive and deductive variables and causal and attribute‐based variables. This model is based on Qualitizing data and replacing most of the qualitative steps performed in any given ethnographic study with quantitative methods. A total of 62 Deductive codes were obtained from four literature reviews and were consistently tested in the research. In addition 34 Inductive codes emerged from the research being most of them completely new to the extant literatures examined. Twelve datasets collected from the Spanish Retail Banking industry were used to first confirm the existence and then isolate and examine in detail the anatomy of the Job Construct in three Circumstances. The richness of the study (in total 106,452 codes were elicited) allowed to clinically compare the different Job Constructs that were obtained and comprehend in details their inner workings. Three of their branches – that had been Inductively described in the extant literature – were confirmed but also two more branches were also identified. An additional two were observed but not subsequently tested because of the limitations of the Unit of Analysis. The second research methodology used in this research was a Mixed Method (Dillman, 2006; Edmondson and McManus, 2007). The total survey response was 306 registers, this large sample survey analysis was used to: 1) Understand the influence of the Mirroring Hypothesis in the process of Stagnation of firms; 2) Capture the influence of the Job Construct on the Resource Allocation Process and how it reignites new net growth and 3) Triangulate the findings on the Job Construct that had been obtained using the Multi‐Method Model. This study shows that the Mirroring Hypothesis is what’s causing that new High‐Margin initiatives fail to gain Impetus. It shows that Inertia, Competency Traps and Organizational Rigidities are lagging effects of the Mirroring Hypothesis. Another finding is that the Needs Construct doesn’t contain the information necessary to overcome the Mirroring Hypothesis and that the Mirroring Hypothesis doesn’t block uniformly the firm but that its influence is different in each Functional Unit. The study concludes that the Job Construct contains the information necessary to overcome the Mirroring Hypothesis’ rigidities and provide again Impetus to new High‐Margin initiatives. Lastly this study shows that the Job Construct strength can recover a firm that’s suffering from Stagnation, re‐engaging it in new net‐growthDepto. de Organización de EmpresasFac. de Ciencias Económicas y EmpresarialesTRUEunpu