*Apologies for any cross-posting*

Dear colleagues,

We are very pleased to invite you to the Special Session called *To err is robotic: Understanding, preventing and resolving robots' failures in HRI *( code u3f1h)*.*

This special session welcomes works: 1) focusing on how people from perceive robot's failures in short- and long-term interactions, and highlight how different failures influence their perceptions and emotions toward the robots, and 2) exploring different techniques (e.g. inner speech, predictability and transparency of robotic behaviours, Theory of Mind, robot etiquette, Verification Methods, explanations) can foster a natural human-robot communication to reduce the perception of failures and/or help people understand the implications, risks, and goals of robot behaviour.

This Special Session is organised within the 32nd IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (IEEE RO-MAN 2023) will be held at Paradise Hotel in Busan, South Korea from August 28 to 31, 2023.

Please find attached the full call for papers for the Special Session "*To err is robotic: Understanding, preventing and resolving robots' failures in HRI*".

Kindest regards

Alessandra Rossi, Kheng Lee Koay, Kerstin S. Haring

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SPECIAL SESSION

To err is robotic: Understanding, preventing and resolving robots' failures in HRI

Code u3f1h

Robots placed in human-oriented dynamic environments, such as private homes, shopping malls, healthcare facilities, are likely to exhibit occasional behaviours which are perceived by people as unexpected, failures, or actual errors. Robots' errors can negatively affect people's perception of the robotic behaviours, in terms of usefulness, functionalities and capabilities, trustworthiness and acceptability. Robotics errors and how these are perceived by people do not only depend on robot self, but they are also a consequence of other factors. For example, they may be a consequence of human errors, or an unclear and non-transparent communication, or they may depend on a misunderstanding and miscommunication of the social, psychological and cognitive conventions expected by people. Moreover, there are also some cases in which these behaviours may be perceived as if robots intentionally deceive or cheat people. As a consequence, these may result in people wrongly interpreting and predicting the robots’ intents and behaviours, and negatively affecting Human-Robot Interaction (HRI).

This session will focus on examine how people from perceive robot's failures in short- and long-term interactions, and highlight how different failures influence their perceptions and emotions toward the robots.

This will help with subject related to classifying of robot errors from the aspect of human (e.g. intentional, voluntarily, perceived vs. real errors -- recklessness, forgetfulness, poor motivation --) and robot dimensions (e.g. actual error - algorithms, sensors, actuators). Moreover, while dealing with robotic failures, it is fundamental to consider two different strategies. The first one is oriented to prevent robots from exhibiting unintended behaviours, which in some extreme cases may even endanger people’s, pets’ safety, or break objects. Some examples are meant to enable robots to adapt and recover from any erroneous behaviour, such as the use of Software Verification Methods, Theory of Mind, robot etiquette. Others are focused on mitigating the effects of robot errors with apologies, promises or creating transparent robotic behaviours.

This session will explore how different techniques can be used to enhancing natural human-robot communication (such as inner speech, legibility, predictability and transparency of robotic behaviours, explicit and non-explicit strategies) to help people understand the implications, risks, and goals of robots' behaviours and to mitigate the perception of the failures. In this session, we also want to explore strategies both to prevent robots from exhibiting unintended behaviours, and to mitigate the effects of robot errors on human-robot interaction.

The topics covered in this special session are in line with the main theme of the conference (i.e., “Design New Bridge for H-R-I”). In particular, we want to start by fostering the [R] Robotic Recovery and Reconnection to allow [I] Intelligent Interface and Interaction for the [H] Human Health, Happiness and Hope. Notably, accepted topics include, but are not limited to:

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Explainable AI (XAI) in HRI -

Multi-modal situation awareness and spatial cognition -

Social intelligence for robots in interactive and non-interactive tasks -

Verifications Methods for autonomous agents -

Legibility, Predictability and Transparency in HRI -

Cognitive robotics -

Deception in HRI -

Robot cheating in HRI -

Theory of Mind, Mental models in HRI -

Robot etiquette -

Modelling Trust and Acceptance in HRI

Important Dates

All dates are in UTC Time Standard

Initial Paper Submission Deadline: March 17, 2023

Notification of Acceptance: May 26, 2023

Final Paper Submission: June 30, 2023

How to submit

Authors should submit their papers electronically in PDF format via the Papercept submission site. For the initial submission, a manuscript can be of 6-8 pages including references. For the final submission, a manuscript should be of 6 pages, With 2 additional pages allowed with an extra charge (TBA). All papers are reviewed using a single-blind review process.

All papers are reviewed using a single-blind review process: authors declare their names and affiliations in the manuscript for the reviewers to see, but reviewers do not know each other's identities, nor do the authors receive information about who has reviewed their manuscript.

Authors should use the templates provided by the electronic submission system. The templates for US Letter format paper should be used. Please use the following templates:

Templates: LaTeX https://ras.papercept.net/conferences/support/tex.php or MSWord https://ras.papercept.net/conferences/support/word.php

Papers should be submitted on http://ras.papercept.net/ under the "Submit a contribution to RO-MAN 2023", by selecting special session paper, and use the code: u3f1h

Do not forget the code and to select the special session paper.

Organisers

Dr. Alessandra Rossi - University of Naples Federico II, Italy - a**************i@unina.it

Kheng Lee Koay - University of Hertfordshire, UK - k******y@herts.ac.uk

Kerstin Sophie Haring - University of Denver, USA - b************r@ieee.org

For further information, please do not hesitate to contact us!