Human-Robot Meditation Retreat: Development, Deployment, and Assessment
This project follows up on a 6-month robot new moon meditation series using LLMs, robot gestural programming, and live deployments of robots around people in Jan-Jun 2024. This time, we would like to use Fall Term to develop and test technology, working with collaborators at the Marigold Center to develop a format and schedule for a half-day Winter Term retreat, next analyzing that data and updating the technology based on what we have learned. Experience working with embodied hardware, sensors, and language technology would be part of the project.
Objectives
Pepper robot generative and/or interactive script development, mini-Pupper quadraped motion and speech programming, Amazon dot or similar custom voice integration. We would like to assess the impact of embodiment and implement a variety of meditation styles and strategies. Schedule and collaborators described above. Students would work with professor as well as grad students in CHARISMA Robotics research lab.
Motivations
Related Work: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-07-exploring-robots-loving-kindness-meditation.html
excerpt: Researchers at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and Hong Kong Science Park recently explored the potential value of robots as guides for two different types of meditation practices: loving-kindness and walking meditations. Their findings, published in the International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, suggest that the unique characteristics of social robots can impact their effectiveness as assistants during meditation.
"Our recent paper explores the potential use of social robots to maintain or enhance young adults' mental well-being, especially following the stress and isolation arising from the COVID-19 pandemic," Ivy Shiming Huang, one of the researchers who carried out the study, told Medical Xpress. "We aimed to address mental-health care avoidance by proposing robot-guided interventions, specifically loving-kindness and walking meditations, that can be conveniently practiced at home."
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications:
Passion and technical skills.
Preferred Qualifications:- computer vision
- robotics
- nlp
- hci
- hri
- behavioral research
- domain expertise
Details
Project Partner:
Heather Knight
NDA/IPA:No Agreement Required
Number Groups:1
Project Status:Accepting Applicants
Website:charismarobotics.com
Keywords:
Embedded SystemsResearchRoboticsHCI / UX / UIConsultancyArtificial Intelligence AI