An Always On Relational Agent for Social Support of Older Adults
The purpose of this project is the creation of intelligent virtual and robotic agents capable of providing social, instrumental, and social network support to older adults living alone. The resulting agents are capable of continuous, always on, operation, with persistent social and relational goals, enabling them to proactively provide support. The agents will be evaluated in a series of longitudinal studies in which several virtual and robotic agents are installed in the homes of older adults.
This work is in collaboration with Drs. Candy Sidner and Chuck Rich at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and is supported by the National Science Foundation (IIS-09557).
Publications
- Social Support Agents for Older Adults: Longitudinal Affective Computing in the Home
Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces
Ring, L., Shi, L., Totzke, K., Bickmore, T. (to appear) - An Always-On Companion for Isolated Older Adults
International Workshop on Techniques Toward Companion Technologies
Sidner, C., Bickmore, T., Rich, C., Barry, B., Ring, L., Behrooz, M., and Shayganfar, M. (2013) - Addressing Loneliness and Isolation in Older Adults: Proactive Affective Agents Provide Better Support.
International Conference on Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction (ACII)
Ring, L., Barry, B., Totzke, K., Bickmore, T. (2013) [PDF] - Demonstration of an Always-On Companion for Isolated Older Adults.
14th Annual SIGdial Meeting on Discourse and Dialogue (SIGDIAL)
Sidner, C., Bickmore, T., Rich, C., Barry, B., Ring, L., Behrooz, M., Shayganfar, M. (2013) [PDF] - Designing Relational Agents as Long Term Social Companions for Older Adults.
Intelligent Virtual Agents conference (IVA)
Vardoulakis, L., Ring, L., Barry, B., Sidner, C., and Bickmore, T. (2012) [PDF] - Affective Computing: Virtual Agents that Respond to User Mood.
Intelligent Virtual Agents conference (IVA)
Ring, L., Bickmore, T., and Schulman, D. Longitudinal (2012) [PDF]