Event Location: NSH 1305
Bio: Peter Robinson is Professor of Computer Technology in the Computer Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, where he leads the Rainbow Research Group working on computer graphics and interaction. His research concerns problems at the boundary between people and computers. This involves investigating new technologies to enhance communication between computers and their users, and new applications to exploit these technologies. The main focus for this is human-computer interaction, where he has been leading work for some years on the use of video and paper as part of the user interface. Recent projects have involved the inference of people’s mental states from facial expressions, vocal nuances, body posture and gesture, and other physiological signals, and also considered the expression of emotions by robots and cartoon avatars.

Abstract: The ability to display and recognise emotions is an important aspect of social interaction between humans. We monitor each other’s facial expressions, vocal nuances and body posture and gestures, and use them to make inferences about other people’s mental states. Our understanding of mental states shapes the decisions that we make, governs how we communicate with others, and affects our performance. People express these social signals even when we are interacting with machines, but computer interfaces currently ignore them. In effect, computers are autistic. Recent advances in psychology have greatly improved our understanding of the role of affect in communication, perception, decision-making, attention and memory. At the same time, advances in technology mean that it is becoming possible for machines to sense, analyse and express emotions. Computer systems with emotional awareness can analyse a person’s facial expressions, tone of voice and body posture and gestures. They infer a person’s underlying mental state, such as whether he or she is agreeing or disagreeing, interested or bored, thinking or confused. Similar techniques endow humanoid robots with the ability to display the same signals. The techniques have applications in areas such as monitoring cognitive load in command and control operators, guiding on-line teaching systems and enhancing the sense of presence in teleconference systems.