Muhammet Ramoğlu; İdil Bostan, Koç University Mohammad Obaid, Uppsala University Tilbe Göksun; Oğuzhan Özcan, Koç University

1. Interaction between abstract agents: Increasing the
readability of causal events with animation
principles
Muhammet Ramoğlu¹, İdil Bostan¹, Mohammad Obaid², Tilbe Göksun³, Oğuzhan Özcan¹
¹ Koç University – Arçelik Research Center for Creative Industries (KUAR), Istanbul, Turkey
² Department of Information Technology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
³ Department of Psychology, Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey

2. Causal events

3. Michotte’s causality
Michotte, A. E. 1963. The perception of causality. Basic Books, New York.

4. Apparent Behavior
Heider, F. and Simmel, M. 1944. An experimental study of apparent behavior. The American Journal of Psychology. 57, 2, 243–259.

5. Force dynamics
PreventHelp
George, R. N. 2014. The force of language: How children acquire the semantic categories of force dynamics. Doctoral Thesis. Temple University, Philadelphia.

6. PROPOSAL
Can we increase the understanding of
causal events by re-designing the actions
of agents?
PROBLEM
Experiments were not fully described as
causal events by many participants

7. Expressive actions

8. Characteristics of agents
Emotions and product messages
Body movements
Speed and Direction
Saerbeck, M. and Bartneck, C. 2010. Perception of affect elicited by robot motion. HRI’10. 53–60.
Novikova, J. and Watts, L. 2014. A design model of emotional body expressions in non-humanoid robots. HAI ’14. 353–360.
Jung, J., Bae, S. H., Lee, J. H. and Kim, M. S. 2013. Make it move: a movement design method of simple standing products based on systematic mapping of torso movements & product messages. CHI ’13. 1279-
1288.

9. 12 Animation Principles
The Illusion of Life: Disney Animaiton by Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas

10. Anticipation
«Before a character reaches to grab an object, he first raises his
arms as he stares at the article, broadcasting the fact that he is
going to do something with that particular object»
Lasseter, J. 1987. Principles of traditional animation applied to 3D computer animation. ACM SIGGRAPH Computer Graphics. 21, 4, 35–44.

12. Timing

13. Express the behavior of agent
Van Breemen, A. J. N. 2004. Bringing robots to life: Applying principles of animation to robots. In Proceedings of Shaping Human-Robot Interaction workshop held at CHI ‘04 Conference. 143-144.
Ribeiro, T. and Paiva, A. 2012. The Illusion of Robotic Life Principles and Practices of Animation for Robots. HRI’12. 383-390.
Animation principles in HCI
Appealing agents

14. Anticipation will increase the readability
Showing reaction will positively effect the ratings of the agent
Takayama, L., Dooley, D. and Ju, W. 2011. Expressing thought: improving robot readability with animation principles. HRI’11. 69-76.

15. Emotions
Gestures and facial expressions
Human-like appearance
Causal events
Abstract agents

16. Novikova, J., Ren, G. and Watts, L. 2015. It’s Not the Way You Look, It’s How You Move: Validating a General Scheme for Robot Affective Behaviour. Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2015. 239-258.
Rimé, B., Boulanger, B., Laubin, P., Richir, M. and Stroobants, K. 1985. The perception of interpersonal emotions originated by patterns of movement. Motivation and emotion. 9, 3, 241-260.
Saerbeck, M. and Bartneck, C. 2010. Perception of affect elicited by robot motion. HRI’10. 53–60.
Actions > Appearance

17. Research questions
(H1) Expressive actions, which are created by the use of the animation principles, will increase
the readability of the interaction between abstract agents in causal events.
(H2) The type of the agents’ embodiment will not change the effect of expressive actions on the
readability of interaction between abstract agents.

18. Study

19. Conditions
1- Expressive actions with objects
2- Non-exprressive actions objects
3- Expressive actions with robots
4- Non-expressive actions with robots

20. Expressive actions (Objects)

21. Non-expressive actions (Objects)

22. Agent design

23. Scenario
One agent was sick/tired/wounded/out of battery
Wanted to reach the target area
Another agent helped the agent to reach its goal

24. Design of body movements

25. Between-subject study
N = 116 (66 female)
Mean age = 26.1 (SD 6.2)
Online survey

26. • Describe what is happening in this clip
• What is the yellow/green agent trying to do?
• How confident do you feel about your answer?
• Rate yellow/green agent based on following parameters
• What influenced you to make these definitions?
Questions

27. Results and
Discussion

28. H1 - Expressive actions will increase the readability
H2 - The type of embodiment will not change the effect of
expressive actions on the readability

29. Participants were less sure for their answers

30. Trait questions

31. Design Speculations

32. We can understand abstract agents with expressive actions

33. Abstract robots
trend in HRI
Sphero, Cubic, Jibo, Roomba, Amazon Echo

34. Relation between agents (visible interaction)

35. Rescue team of humans, drones, and mobile robots

36. Human-like actions?

37. Future

38. Appearance + Action + Context =
Meaning

39. Context
Force dynamics: Cause, Prevent, Despite

40. Participants
Adults to children

41. Medium
Digital to physical
OMG!
SO EXCITED
SO MUCH
HYPE!

42. References for Images
https://www.flickr.com/photos/130599071@N04/16226927766/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/captainrocket/9583315906/
http://www.strath.ac.uk/media/1newwebsite/departmentsubject/mathematicsandstatistics/1600x600/MathsBlackboard1600x600.jpg
https://www.wikiart.org/en/raphael/school-of-athens-detail-from-right-hand-side-showing-diogenes-on-the-steps-and-euclid-
1511?utm_source=returned&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=referral
https://www.flickr.com/photos/54043854@N08/5410627145/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/cdb033/6697410649/
http://robot-envy.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Botober13-015.png
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GOyiXwYe7mk/UmijcQWcMjI/AAAAAAAACe0/LFg15Ela2sg/s1600/22.jpg
http://funtastique.fr/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/mur-humain.jpg
https://wordlesstech.com/pars-arial-rescue-robot/
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d8/NASA_Mars_Rover.jpg
http://www.flaticon.com

43. Q & A
Contact: mramoglu15@ku.edu.tr