Browsing by Author "Schermerhorn, Paul W."

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    The appearance, speech, and motion of synthetic humans influences our empathy toward them
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2011-04-08) MacDorman, Karl F.; Ho, Chin-Chang; Lu, Amy S.; Mitchell, Wade J.; Patel, Himalaya; Srinivas, Preethi; Schermerhorn, Paul W.; Scheutz, Matthias
    Humanoid robots and computer-generated humans can elicit responses that people usually direct toward each other. As a result these humanlike entities may stand in for human actors during experiment-driven research in the social and psychological sciences as well as in some branches of neuroscience. Such research concerns factors like facial appearance, physical embodiment, speech quality, fluidity of motion, and contingent interactivity. A goal of this research is to understand why some humanlike entities are more successful than others at eliciting people’s empathy. Pursuing this goal informs new principles for creating synthetic humans that seem more believable in narratives and narrative-based interventions.
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    Probing People's Attitudes and Behaviors Using Humanlike Agents
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2010-04-09) MacDorman, Karl F.; Gadde, Prathik; Ho, Chin-Chang; Mitchell, Wade J.; Schermerhorn, Paul W.; Scheutz, Matthias
    Android science is an interdisciplinary framework for studying human cognition and interaction based on the finding that android robots—and, to lesser extents, humanoid robots and computergenerated humans—can elicit the sorts of responses people direct toward each other. As a result, these humanlike agents can be used as stand-ins for humans in social, psychological, cognitive, and neuroscientific experiments. We describe a selection of current and recently completed investigations into some of the potential factors influencing attitudes and behavior toward humanlike agents, including facial appearance, physical embodiment, speech quality, fluidity of motion, and contingent interactivity.