Phobot is a

robot A robot is a machine—especially one programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the control may be embedded within. Robots may be c ...

that exhibits

behaviour Behavior (American English) or behaviour (British English) is the range of actions and mannerisms made by individuals, organisms, systems or artificial entities in some environment. These systems can include other systems or organisms as wel ...

that mimics

fear Fear is an intensely unpleasant emotion in response to perceiving or recognizing a danger or threat. Fear causes physiological changes that may produce behavioral reactions such as mounting an aggressive response or fleeing the threat. Fear ...

and overcoming it by graded exposure. The robot was voted the public's favourite at a conference on

human–robot interaction Human–robot interaction is the study of interactions between humans and robots. It is often referred as HRI by researchers. Human–robot interaction is a multidisciplinary field with contributions from human–computer interaction, artificial i ...

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

. It was designed by a team of students at the

University of Amsterdam The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, nl, Universiteit van Amsterdam) is a public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The UvA is one of two large, publicly funded research universities in the city, the other being ...

, and constructed from

Lego Lego ( , ; stylized as LEGO) is a line of plastic construction toys that are manufactured by The Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of variously colored interlocking ...

. It was designed to help children deal with

phobia A phobia is an anxiety disorder defined by a persistent and excessive fear of an object or situation. Phobias typically result in a rapid onset of fear and are usually present for more than six months. Those affected go to great lengths to avo ...

s and anxieties.

Behaviour

When Phobot sees a larger robot, it retreats, and spins around, making high pitched noises, seemingly in panic. When it is gradually exposed to smaller robots, and is coached by holding its hands and talking to it in a soothing manner, it learns to overcome its fear. in Dutch This approach mimics the process of systematic desensitization, or graded exposure treatment, common in the treatment of phobias.

Design

Phobot was built for a competition at the international conference on human-robot interaction 2008 from a

Lego Mindstorms Lego Mindstorms is a hardware and software structure which develops programmable robots based on Lego building blocks. Each version includes computer Lego bricks, a set of modular sensors and motors, and Lego parts from the Technic line to ...

robot kit, and its behaviour implemented in the Mindstorms software. It uses

RFID Radio-frequency identification (RFID) uses electromagnetic fields to automatically identify and track tags attached to objects. An RFID system consists of a tiny radio transponder, a radio receiver and transmitter. When triggered by an electromag ...

, sound and touch sensors to interact with humans. It was designed as a low cost proof of concept for an affective robot, coaching children to deal with phobias and anxieties.

References

External links

Phobot homepage

Human-robot interaction conference 2008
{{University of Amsterdam Rolling robots University of Amsterdam Therapeutic robots Robots of the Netherlands Humanoid robots 2008 robots