What is it about?
This paper explores the concept of embodiment and interaction with non-anthropomorphic entities by designing a space, The Room, as a social, interactive avatar. This “Room” disrupts conventional body and interaction norms, functioning as both a participant and the environment of the interaction. Through haptic feedback in a VR setup, the study examines how such spaces can communicate non-verbally, challenging traditional social cognition and embodiment concepts.
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Why is it important?
The study is significant as it investigates fundamental aspects of embodiment and social interaction with non-human, non-verbal entities. By pushing beyond anthropomorphic limitations, it offers insights into alternative forms of social presence and interaction, which could benefit fields like robotics, immersive media, and VR. This work also addresses the broader implications of how we might engage with future intelligent environments and technologies.
Perspectives
This pilot study of my research track on spaces as bodies has been a very interesting and challenging first step. The core idea was to start from a very minimalistic representation, for the Room’s body, but especially for the room’s controller perception in VR. The original idea was to actually have no visual feedback for that user, imagining the room as a “blind” organism that would only perceive through touch. This is the reason for the very extensive and stimulating horizontal research on haptic sensations and devices that could cause them. I was impressed by the amount of rich insights that this pilot provided, from the space as body design framework to the experience of the controller, both visually and from the haptic devices.
Federico Espositi
Politecnico di Milano
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The Room: Design and Embodiment of Spaces as Social Beings, October 2024, ACM (Association for Computing Machinery),
DOI: 10.1145/3664647.3681689.
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