Playful Physical Child-Robot Interaction and the Luxo Jr. Effect in Acroban the Humanoid

This video demonstrates that Acroban affords original
physical human-robot interactions where
joints become interfaces and compliance provides safety and
intuitiveness. Acroban provokes spontaneous highly positive emotional
reactions, especially in children. Yet, as opposed to many other
robots, its morphology is neither roundish nor cute. He has no big
eyes. He is just made of metal, and its appearance shows it
explicitly. At first glance, its visual appearance creates low
expectation of intelligence and life-likeness. But when it begins to
move and one can touch it, its natural dynamics, much more life-like
than most other robots, triggers a high contrast and positive
surprise. Life unexpectedly appears out of a neutral metallic object,
much as Pixar's Luxo Jr. This is why we call it the Luxo Jr. effect.

A live demonstration of Acroban will appear at Siggraph 2010 Emerging Technologies:
Ly, O., Oudeyer, P-Y. (2010) Acroban the Humanoid: Playful and Compliant Physical Child-Robot Interaction, in ACM SIGGRAPH'2010 Emerging Technologies.

More info on: http://flowers.inria.fr/acroban.php (INRIA FLOWERS)

Keywords: Developmental robotics, humanoid, robotics, passive dynamic walking, vertebral column, spine, compliance, robot, biped,
human-robot interaction, child-robot interaction, Luxo Jr. effect,
morphological computation, semi-passive dynamics, physical human-robot interaction, personal robotics, inria, flowers

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• INRIA
• Developmental robotics
• humanoid
• robotics
• passive dynamic walking
• vertebral column
• spine
• compliance
• robot
• biped
• human-robot interaction
• child-robot interaction
• Luxo Jr. effect
• morphological computation
• semi-passive dynamics
• personal robotics
• inria
• flowers
• Siggraph 2010.