Working with troubles and failures in conversation between humans and robots

In order to carry out human-robot collaborative tasks efficiently, robots have to be able to communicate with their human counterparts. In many applications, speech interfaces are deployed as a way to empower robots with the ability to communicate. Despite the progress made in speech recognition and (multi-modal) dialogue systems, such interfaces continue to be brittle in a number of ways and the experience of the failure of such interfaces is commonplace amongst roboticists. Surprisingly, a rigorous and complete analysis of communicative failures is still missing, and the technical literature is positively skewed towards the success and good performance of speech interfaces. In order to address this blind spot and investigate failures in conversations between humans and robots, an interdisciplinary effort is necessary. This workshop aims to raise awareness of said blind spot and provide a platform for discussing communicative troubles and failures in human-robot interactions and potentially related failures in non-robotic speech interfaces. We aim to bring together researchers studying communication in different fields, to start a scrupulous investigation into communicative failures, to begin working on a taxonomy of such failures, and enable a preliminary discussion on possible mitigating strategies. This workshop intends to be a venue where participants can freely discuss the failures they have encountered, to positively and constructively learn from them

Health care help seeking behaviour among prisoners in Norway

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Prisoners are associated with high health care needs compared with the general population. This study aims to investigate prisoners' use of health service.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A cross-sectional study of 29 prisons in central and southern parts of Norway. A questionnaire was distributed to 1, 454 prisoners (90% response rate). Multilevel analyses were employed to analyse help seeking behaviour among the prisoners.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Help seeking was substantially associated with sleep problems and drug problems. There was also a tendency for closed prisons as well as high staffing levels of healthcare professionals to be associated with elevated health care use.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>This study suggests that sleep problems and drug use are most frequently associated with health service use. The differences in health care use between prisons suggest that the implementation of prison health care standards should be addressed.</p

Simultaneous wavelength conversion of two 40 Gbit/s channels using four-wave mixing in a semiconductor optical amplifier

Two 40 Gbit/s wavelength channels have been simultaneously wavelength converted in a single semiconductor optical amplifier using four-wave mixing. Bit error ratio measurements show a good performance in both cases

A Meta-analysis of Vulnerability and Trust in Human-Robot Interaction

In human-robot interaction studies, trust is often defined as a process whereby a trustor makes themselves vulnerable to a trustee. The role of vulnerability however is often overlooked in this process but could play an important role in the gaining and maintenance of trust between users and robots. To better understand how vulnerability affects human-robot trust, we first reviewed the literature to create a conceptual model of vulnerability with four vulnerability categories. We then performed a meta-analysis, first to check the overall contribution of the variables included on trust. The results showed that overall, the variables investigated in our sample of studies have a positive impact on trust. We then conducted two multilevel moderator analysis to assess the effect of vulnerability on trust, including: 1) An intercept model that considers the relationship between our vulnerability categories; and 2) A non-intercept model that treats each vulnerability category as an independent predictor. Only model 2 was significant, suggesting that to build trust effectively, research should focus on improving robot performance in situations where the users is unsure how reliable the robot will be. As our vulnerability variable is derived from studies of human-robot interaction and human-human studies of risk, we relate our findings to these domains and make suggestions for future research avenues

A Meta-analysis of Vulnerability and Trust in Human-Robot Interaction

In human-robot interaction studies, trust is often defined as a process whereby a trustor makes themselves vulnerable to a trustee. The role of vulnerability however is often overlooked in this process but could play an important role in the gaining and maintenance of trust between users and robots. To better understand how vulnerability affects human-robot trust, we first reviewed the literature to create a conceptual model of vulnerability with four vulnerability categories. We then performed a meta-analysis, first to check the overall contribution of the variables included on trust. The results showed that overall, the variables investigated in our sample of studies have a positive impact on trust. We then conducted two multilevel moderator analysis to assess the effect of vulnerability on trust, including: 1) An intercept model that considers the relationship between our vulnerability categories; and 2) A non-intercept model that treats each vulnerability category as an independent predictor. Only model 2 was significant, suggesting that to build trust effectively, research should focus on improving robot performance in situations where the users is unsure how reliable the robot will be. As our vulnerability variable is derived from studies of human-robot interaction and human-human studies of risk, we relate our findings to these domains and make suggestions for future research avenues