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Automatic Joint Attention Detection During Interaction with a Humanoid Robot

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Book cover Social Robotics (ICSR 2015)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 9388))

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Abstract

Joint attention is an early-developing social-communicative skill in which two people (usually a young child and an adult) share attention with regards to an interesting object or event, by means of gestures and gaze, and its presence is a key element in evaluating the therapy in the case of autism spectrum disorders. In this work, a novel automatic system able to detect joint attention by using completely non-intrusive depth camera installed on the room ceiling is presented. In particular, in a scenario where a humanoid-robot, a therapist (or a parent) and a child are interacting, the system can detect the social interaction between them. Specifically, a depth camera mounted on the top of a room is employed to detect, first of all, the arising event to be monitored (performed by an humanoid robot) and, subsequently, to detect the eventual joint attention mechanism analyzing the orientation of the head. The system operates in real-time, providing to the therapist a completely non-intrusive instrument to help him to evaluate the quality and the precise modalities of this predominant feature during the therapy session.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Research Council of Italy, Lecce, Italy

    Pier Luigi Mazzeo, Paolo Spagnolo & Cosimo Distante

  2. Faculty of Engineering, University of Salento, Lecce, Italy

    Dario Cazzato

Authors
  1. Dario Cazzato
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  2. Pier Luigi Mazzeo
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  3. Paolo Spagnolo
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  4. Cosimo Distante
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Paolo Spagnolo .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Robotics and Computer Vision Lab, ENSTA-ParisTech, Palaiseau, France

    Adriana Tapus

  2. Inst für Informatik, Human-Ctr Multimedi, Universität Augsburg, Augsburg, Bayern, Germany

    Elisabeth André

  3. LIMSI-CNRS, Orsay, France

    Jean-Claude Martin

  4. Robotics and Computer Vision Lab, ENSTA-ParisTech, Palaiseau, France

    François Ferland

  5. LIMSI-CNRS, Orsay, France

    Mehdi Ammi

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© 2015 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

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Cazzato, D., Mazzeo, P.L., Spagnolo, P., Distante, C. (2015). Automatic Joint Attention Detection During Interaction with a Humanoid Robot. In: Tapus, A., André, E., Martin, JC., Ferland, F., Ammi, M. (eds) Social Robotics. ICSR 2015. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 9388. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-25554-5_13

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-25554-5_13

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-25553-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-25554-5

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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