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 Relational Machines  posted by  member150_php   on 2/20/2009  Add Courseware to favorites Add To Favorites  
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Abstract/Syllabus:

Breazeal, Cynthia, MAS.965 Relational Machines, Spring 2005. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology: MIT OpenCourseWare), http://ocw.mit.edu (Accessed 08 Jul, 2010). License: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA

Relational Machines

Spring 2005

Leo.

The robot Leo. (Image courtesy of Andrea Lockerd and Guy Hoffman.)

Course Highlights

This course features set of weekly reading responses in the assignments section as well as examples of students' final projects.

Course Description

This course examines the issues, principles, and challenges toward building relational machines through a combination of studio-style design and critique along with lecture, lively discussion of course readings, and assignments. Insights from social psychology, human-computer interaction, and design will be examined, as well as how these ideas are manifest in a broad range of applications for software agents and robots.

Syllabus

Course Description

Relational machines are technological artifacts that interact with people on an ongoing and extended basis to the benefit of their users. Sample applications include learning companions for children, assistive robots for the elderly, software agents that act as trainers or assistants, interactive game characters that engage in social relationships, or machines that cooperate with humans as members of human-robot teams. In these scenarios, the user interacts with the machine as a peer rather than as a tool. Furthermore, the social rapport between human and machine has a positive impact on performance gains. This raises the question of how to design for a successful human-machine relationship over the long-term. What kinds of relationships can be established and maintained between humans and technological artifacts? How might one model such a relationship, reliably measure its important aspects, and modify them in order to create successful interactions over time? What kinds of relationships have been explored and how will they evolve in the future?

This course examines the issues, principles, and challenges toward building relational machines through a combination of studio-style design and critique along with lectures, lively discussion of course readings, and assignments. Insights from social psychology, human-computer interaction, and design will be examined, as well as how these ideas are manifest in a broad range of applications for software agents and robots. Student projects explore selected course themes in depth. There will be a final project due at the end of the semester.

Grading


activities percentages
Weekly Written Critiques of Readings 25%
Class Participation/Presentations 25%
Term Project/Paper 50%

Weekly Readings

Students are required to submit a 1-2 page critique or reaction to the readings at noon the day before class meets.

Student Participation/Presentations

This class will be a combination of lecture/discussion with a project studio format. The first hour shall comprise review and discussion of course readings. The second hour will consist of in-class exercises to small design problems followed by short presentations and discussion.

Term Project

One goal of this course is to go through a full design cycle of a relational artifact. This includes developing a design concept of a relational artifact, getting feedback from focus groups, implementing technical aspects of it, evaluating those aspects, and possibly revising the design. A working demo at the end of the semester is ideal.

Calendar

week # Topics key dates
1 Introduction, Why Relational Machines?  
2 Representing and Manipulating Relationships Project exercise 1 - Relationship Basics due
3 Measuring Aspects of Relationships and Interactions Project exercise 2 - Defining the Relationship due
4 Issues in Particular Populations Project exercise 3 - Further Refinements due
5 Interactions with Assistive and Therapeutic Agents  
6 Interactions with Machine Teammates Project exercise 4 - Interview Preparation due
7 Guest Lecture  
8 Interactions with Learning Companion and Tutorial Agents  
9 Interaction with Trainers and Assistant Agents  
10 Interaction with Trainers and Assistant Agents (cont.)  
11 Interaction with Wearable or Ambient Agents  
12 Interactions with Entertainment Agents  
13 Sponsor Week  
14 Final Presentations Final projects due



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