SiR - Lecture 6

What is social intelligence in robots? (Definition)

The ability to recognize, interpret, and express social cues, social signals, and social behaviors.

Why does SSP matter?

Humans feel “seen” by the robot → increases social presence, engagement, trust, and natural interaction.

What is a social cue?

Visible/physical behavior (e.g., gaze, posture, voice tone).

What is a social signal?

The meaning we interpret from cues (e.g., “she is bored”).

What are the steps of the Social Signal Processing pipeline?

Sense (audio/video) → extract cues → interpret signals → robot responds.

Is clothing on robots socially meaningful?

Not well understood; unclear if clothing affects judgments the same way as with humans.

What does FACS do? (Definition)

Breaks facial expressions into Action Units (AUs) to classify emotions.

What vocal cues carry social information?

Prosody, backchannels, fillers, non-linguistic sounds, silence.

What does posture reveal?

Engagement—e.g., inclusive = looking at person; mirroring = rapport.

Why is gaze crucial for robots?

Enables joint attention, turn-taking, engagement detection.

Why are robot tablets problematic?

Tablets strongly attract attention → helpful when primary, distracting when secondary.

What is AOI? (Definition)

Area of Interest where the robot checks where the user is looking to trigger actions.

Give an example of gaze-based interaction.

Using gaze to turn pages or navigate menus.

What does a robot need to greet properly?

Detect presence → identify person → decide who & when to greet → greet in time.

What is proxemics?

Understanding social distances: intimate, personal, social, public.

What is context awareness?

Understanding the situation (where, what, when, who).

What are the W4 components?

Where, What, When, Who.

What are the W5+ components?

Where, What, When, Who + Why, How.