The study, begun Tuesday at the University of Central Florida, positions a human surrogate — a robot — in the lobby of the university’s Institute for Simulation and Training. The bot will speak to passerby students and visitors, and will be controlled by a human operator in another location for several weeks.
— Kristen Compton (@KCompton_RPC) December 4, 2014
Navy officials explained the experiment is part of ONR’s three-year Human Surrogate Interaction program, designed to examine how well humans communicate with virtual, physical and other types of surrogates. The results will be used to best determine how to use robots for training infantry and other forces within the U.S. Marine Corps.
“Marine Corps training concepts continue to merge virtual and live components to create the most realistic, effective and affordable training for Marines,” Peter Squire, a program officer for ONR, said in a press release. “The way people react to and interact with the different surrogates in this study is crucial to understanding how we can improve our military training systems.”
The Navy explained that the current research will hopefully indicate whether the use of surrogates would be more appropriate in more complex situations that would require more human-machine interaction.
One of ONR’s other goals is the creation of a new system called AMITIES, or Avatar Mediated Interactive Training and Individualized Experience, that will allow military personnel to “inhabit” and control various robots.
AMITIES will create new training possibilities by combining artificial intelligence, tone and voice inflections, network protocols, and human control.
“If human role players are not available because of cost or other reasons, this research will help us understand the type of surrogate to replace them with so that the level of training is not diminished,” Squire said in the statement.
The Navy will be demonstrating the new military gear at the Naval Future Force Science and Technology Expo in Washington on February 4 and 5.
