Event Location: Mauldin Auditorium (NSH 1305)
Bio: Brian Scassellati is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Yale University. Using computational modeling and socially interactive robots, his research evaluates models of how infants acquire social skills and assists in the diagnosis and quantification of disorders of social development (such as autism). Dr. Scassellati received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2001. He is the recipient of an NSF Career award, five best paper awards, and is an Alfred P. Sloan fellow.

Abstract: This talk describes three lines of research that use social robots as tools to build a greater understanding of human social abilities: (1) Robots can be “evocative objects” which allow us to probe the range of human social capabilities. (2) Robots can be evaluation platforms for models of human development. (3) Robots can be educational and assistive devices that support social learning in typical children and children with social developmental disorders. Examples from some of our recent work in each of these areas will be presented.