@inproceedings{53330, author = {{Tolksdorf, Nils Frederik and Wildt, Eugenia and Rohlfing, Katharina}}, booktitle = {{Companion of the 2024 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction}}, isbn = {{9798400703232}}, pages = {{1053--1057}}, publisher = {{ACM}}, title = {{{Preschoolers' Interactions with Social Robots: Investigating the Potential for Eliciting Metatalk and Critical Technological Thinking}}}, doi = {{10.1145/3610978.3640654}}, year = {{2024}}, } @article{57466, abstract = {{Nowadays, from early on, children are exposed to technology and media, and six-month-olds are even expected to use some. There is a wide range of products for babies and toddlers. This article reviews the current state of the art, examining the robustness of word knowledge learned using technologies such as e-books, computer games, digital pens, and social robots, and how individual differences among children impact language learning with technology. It aligns with interactive learning theories, positing that learners need to engage in an interaction in order to construct new knowledge.}}, author = {{Rohlfing, Katharina and Wildt, Eugenia and Tolksdorf, Nils Frederik}}, issn = {{2657-9510}}, journal = {{Dzieciństwo. Literatura i Kultura}}, number = {{1}}, pages = {{35--69}}, publisher = {{University of Warsaw}}, title = {{{Language Learning with Media and Technology in (Early) Childhood}}}, doi = {{10.32798/dlk.1376}}, volume = {{6}}, year = {{2024}}, } @article{53072, abstract = {{Negated statements require more processing efforts than assertions. However, in certain contexts, repeating negations undergo adaptation, which over time mitigates the effort. Here, we ask negations hamper visual processing and whether consecutive repetitions mitigate its influence. We assessed the overall attentional capacity and its distribution, the relative weight, quantitatively using the formal Theory of Visual Attention (TVA). We employed a very simple form for negations, binary negations. Negated instructions, expressing the only alternative to the core supposition, were cognitively demanding, resulting in a loss of attentional capacity in three experiments. The overall attentional capacity recovered gradually but stagnated at a lower level than with assertions, even after many repetitions. Additionally, negations distributed the attention equally between target and reference stimulus. Repetitions slightly increased the reference' share of attention. Assertions, on the other hand, shifted the attentional weight towards the target. Few repetitions slightly decreased the bias towards the target, many repetitions increased the bias.}}, author = {{Banh, Ngoc Chi and Tünnermann, Jan and Rohlfing, Katharina J. and Scharlau, Ingrid}}, journal = {{Frontiers in Psychology}}, title = {{{Benefiting from Binary Negations? Verbal Negations Decrease Visual Attention and Balance Its Distribution}}}, doi = {{10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1451309}}, volume = {{15}}, year = {{2024}}, } @inproceedings{57609, author = {{Tykhonenko, Valeriia and Tolksdorf, Nils Frederik and Rohlfing, Katharina}}, booktitle = {{Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, 46}}, title = {{{How turn-timing can inform about becoming familiar with a task and its changes: a study of shy and less shy four-year-old children.}}}, year = {{2024}}, } @article{58708, abstract = {{Research about explanation processes is gaining relevance because of the increased popularity of artificial systems required to explain their function or outcome. Following an interactive approach, not only explainers, but also explainees contribute to successful interactions. However, little is known about how explainees actively guide explanation processes and how their involvement relates to learning. We explored the occurrence and type of explainees’ questions in 20 adult — adult explanation dialogues about unknown present and absent objects. Crucially, we related the question types to the explainees’ subsequent recall of the unknown object labels. We found that explainees asked different types of questions, especially about the object’s label and facts. Questions about the object’s function were asked more when objects were present. In addition, requests for labelling were linked to better recall. The results contribute to designing explainable AI that aims to provide relevant and adaptive explanations and to further experimental approaches to study explanations.}}, author = {{Fisher, Josephine Beryl and Rohlfing, Katharina J. and Donnellan, Ed and Grimminger, Angela and Gu, Yan and Vigliocco, Gabriella}}, journal = {{Interaction Studies}}, number = {{2}}, pages = {{244--255}}, publisher = {{John Benjamins}}, title = {{{ Explain with, rather than explain to: How explainees shape their own learning}}}, doi = {{doi.org/10.1075/is.23019.fis}}, volume = {{25}}, year = {{2024}}, } @techreport{62908, author = {{Buhl, Heike M. and Fechner, Sabine and Herzig, Bardo and Jenert, Tobias and Kremer, H. - Hugo and Rohlfing, Katharina Justine and Vogelsang, Christoph}}, title = {{{Leitbild des Profibereichs Transformation und Bildung}}}, year = {{2024}}, } @article{48543, abstract = {{Explanation has been identified as an important capability for AI-based systems, but research on systematic strategies for achieving understanding in interaction with such systems is still sparse. Negation is a linguistic strategy that is often used in explanations. It creates a contrast space between the affirmed and the negated item that enriches explaining processes with additional contextual information. While negation in human speech has been shown to lead to higher processing costs and worse task performance in terms of recall or action execution when used in isolation, it can decrease processing costs when used in context. So far, it has not been considered as a guiding strategy for explanations in human-robot interaction. We conducted an empirical study to investigate the use of negation as a guiding strategy in explanatory human-robot dialogue, in which a virtual robot explains tasks and possible actions to a human explainee to solve them in terms of gestures on a touchscreen. Our results show that negation vs. affirmation 1) increases processing costs measured as reaction time and 2) increases several aspects of task performance. While there was no significant effect of negation on the number of initially correctly executed gestures, we found a significantly lower number of attempts—measured as breaks in the finger movement data before the correct gesture was carried out—when being instructed through a negation. We further found that the gestures significantly resembled the presented prototype gesture more following an instruction with a negation as opposed to an affirmation. Also, the participants rated the benefit of contrastive vs. affirmative explanations significantly higher. Repeating the instructions decreased the effects of negation, yielding similar processing costs and task performance measures for negation and affirmation after several iterations. We discuss our results with respect to possible effects of negation on linguistic processing of explanations and limitations of our study.}}, author = {{Groß, A. and Singh, Amit and Banh, Ngoc Chi and Richter, B. and Scharlau, Ingrid and Rohlfing, Katharina J. and Wrede, B.}}, journal = {{Frontiers in Robotics and AI}}, keywords = {{HRI, XAI, negation, understanding, explaining, touch interaction, gesture}}, title = {{{Scaffolding the human partner by contrastive guidance in an explanatory human-robot dialogue}}}, doi = {{10.3389/frobt.2023.1236184}}, volume = {{10}}, year = {{2023}}, } @inproceedings{46067, abstract = {{

The study investigates two different ways of guiding the addressee of an explanation - an explainee, through action demonstration: contrastive and non-contrastive. Their effect was tested on attention to specific action elements (goal) as well as on event memory. In an eye-tracking experiment, participants were shown different motion videos that were either contrastive or non-contrastive with respect to the segments of movement presentation. Given that everyday action demonstration is often multimodal, the stimuli were created with re- spect to their visual and verbal presentation. For visual presentation, a video combined two movements in a contrastive (e.g., Up-motion following a Down-motion) or non-contrastive way (e.g., two Up-motions following each other). For verbal presentation, each video was combined with a sequence of instruction descriptions in the form of negative (i.e., contrastive) or assertive (i.e., non-contrastive) guidance. It was found that a) attention to the event goal increased for this condition in the later time window, and b) participants’ recall of the event was facilitated when a visually contrastive motion was combined with a verbal contrast.

}}, author = {{Singh, Amit and Rohlfing, Katharina J.}}, booktitle = {{Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society 45 (45)}}, keywords = {{Attention, negation, contrastive guidance, eye-movements, action understanding, event representation}}, location = {{Sydney}}, publisher = {{Cognitive Science Society}}, title = {{{Contrastiveness in the context of action demonstration: an eye-tracking study on its effects on action perception and action recall}}}, year = {{2023}}, } @inproceedings{55156, author = {{Fisher, Josephine Beryl and Robrecht, Amelie and Kopp, Stefan and Rohlfing, Katharina J.}}, booktitle = {{Proceedings of the 27th Workshop on the Semantics and Pragmatics of Dialogue }}, location = {{Maribor}}, title = {{{Exploring the Semantic Dialogue Patterns of Explanations – a Case Study of Game Explanations}}}, year = {{2023}}, } @article{51344, abstract = {{Modified action demonstration—dubbed motionese—has been proposed as a way to help children recognize the structure and meaning of actions. However, until now, it has been investigated only in young infants. This brief research report presents findings from a cross-sectional study of parental action demonstrations to three groups of 8–11, 12–23, and 24–30-month-old children that applied seven motionese parameters; a second study investigated the youngest group of participants longitudinally to corroborate the cross-sectional results. Results of both studies suggested that four motionese parameters (Motion Pauses, Pace, Velocity, Acceleration) seem to structure the action by organizing it in motion pauses. Whereas these parameters persist over different ages, three other parameters (Demonstration Length, Roundness, and Range) occur predominantly in the younger group and seem to serve to organize infants' attention on the basis of movement. Results are discussed in terms of facilitative vs. pedagogical learning.}}, author = {{Rohlfing, Katharina and Vollmer, Anna-Lisa and Fritsch, Jannik and Wrede, Britta}}, issn = {{2297-900X}}, journal = {{Frontiers in Communication}}, keywords = {{Social Sciences (miscellaneous), Communication}}, publisher = {{Frontiers Media SA}}, title = {{{Which “motionese” parameters change with children's age? Disentangling attention-getting from action-structuring modifications}}}, doi = {{10.3389/fcomm.2022.922405}}, volume = {{7}}, year = {{2022}}, } @article{37074, abstract = {{Pointing is one of the first conventional means of communication and infants have various motives for engaging in it such as imperative, declarative, or informative. Little is known about the developmental paths of producing and understanding these different motives. In our longitudinal study (N = 58) during the second year of life, we experimentally elicited infants’ pointing production and comprehension in various settings and under pragmatically valid conditions. We followed two steps in our analyses and assessed the occurrence of canonical index-finger pointing for different motives and the engagement in an ongoing interaction in pursuit of a joint goal revealed by frequency and multimodal utterances. For understanding the developmental paths, we compared two groups: typically developing infants (TD) and infants who have been assessed as having delayed language development (LD). Results showed that the developmental paths differed according to the various motives. When comparing the two groups, for all motives, LD infants produced index-finger pointing 2 months later than TD infants. For the engagement, although the pattern was less consistent across settings, the frequency of pointing was comparable in both groups, but infants with LD used less canonical forms of pointing and made fewer multimodal contributions than TD children.}}, author = {{Rohlfing, Katharina J. and Lüke, Carina and Liszkowski, Ulf and Ritterfeld, Ute and Grimminger, Angela}}, issn = {{1660-4601}}, journal = {{International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health}}, keywords = {{Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health}}, number = {{9}}, publisher = {{MDPI AG}}, title = {{{Developmental Paths of Pointing for Various Motives in Infants with and without Language Delay}}}, doi = {{10.3390/ijerph19094982}}, volume = {{19}}, year = {{2022}}, } @inproceedings{46289, author = {{Banh, Ngoc Chi and Scharlau, Ingrid and Rohlfing, Katharina J.}}, booktitle = {{52. Kongress der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Psychologie}}, editor = {{Bermeitinger, Christina and Greve, Werner }}, location = {{Hildesheim, Germany}}, title = {{{Folgen wiederholter Negation auf die Aufmerksamkeit}}}, year = {{2022}}, } @article{34703, abstract = {{One of the many purposes for which social robots are designed is education, and there have been many attempts to systematize their potential in this field. What these attempts have in common is the recognition that learning can be supported in a variety of ways because a learner can be engaged in different activities that foster learning. Up to now, three roles have been proposed when designing these activities for robots: as a teacher or tutor, a learning peer, or a novice. Current research proposes that deciding in favor of one role over another depends on the content or preferred pedagogical form. However, the design of activities changes not only the content of learning, but also the nature of a human–robot social relationship. This is particularly important in language acquisition, which has been recognized as a social endeavor. The following review aims to specify the differences in human–robot social relationships when children learn language through interacting with a social robot. After proposing categories for comparing these different relationships, we review established and more specific, innovative roles that a robot can play in language-learning scenarios. This follows Mead’s (1946) theoretical approach proposing that social roles are performed in interactive acts. These acts are crucial for learning, because not only can they shape the social environment of learning but also engage the learner to different degrees. We specify the degree of engagement by referring to Chi’s (2009) progression of learning activities that range from active, constructive, toward interactive with the latter fostering deeper learning. Taken together, this approach enables us to compare and evaluate different human–robot social relationships that arise when applying a robot in a particular social role.}}, author = {{Rohlfing, Katharina and Altvater-Mackensen, Nicole and Caruana, Nathan and van den Berghe, Rianne and Bruno, Barbara and Tolksdorf, Nils Frederik and Hanulíková, Adriana}}, issn = {{2296-9144}}, journal = {{Frontiers in Robotics and AI}}, keywords = {{Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science Applications}}, publisher = {{Frontiers Media SA}}, title = {{{Social/dialogical roles of social robots in supporting children’s learning of language and literacy—A review and analysis of innovative roles}}}, doi = {{10.3389/frobt.2022.971749}}, volume = {{9}}, year = {{2022}}, } @inproceedings{30952, abstract = {{In child-robot interaction research, many studies pursue the goal to support children's language development. While research in human-human interaction suggests that changing human partners during children's language learning can reduce their recall performance of the learning content, little is known whether a change in social robots as interaction partners influence children's learning in the same way. In this paper, we present findings from a word learning study, in which we changed the robotic partner for one group of children while the other group interacted with the same robot. Contrary to work with human social partners, we found that children did not retrieve words differently when interacting with different humanoid robots as their social interaction partners.}}, author = {{Tolksdorf, Nils Frederik and Hönemann, Dirk and Viertel, Franziska E. and Rohlfing, Katharina}}, booktitle = {{Proceedings of the 2022 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction}}, location = {{Sapporo Hokkaido, Japan}}, pages = {{1069--1074}}, title = {{{Who is that?! Does Changing the Robot as a Learning Companion Impact Preschoolers’Language Learning?}}}, doi = {{10.5555/3523760.3523937}}, year = {{2022}}, } @article{51349, abstract = {{AbstractRecent approaches to Explainable AI (XAI) promise to satisfy diverse user expectations by allowing them to steer the interaction in order to elicit content relevant to them. However, little is known about how and to what extent the explainee takes part actively in the process of explaining. To tackle this empirical gap, we exploratively examined naturally occurring everyday explanations in doctor–patient interactions (N = 11). Following the social design of XAI, we view explanations as emerging in interactions: first, we identified the verbal behavior of both the explainer and the explainee in the sequential context, which we could assign to phases that were either monological or dialogical; second, we investigated in particular who was responsible for the initiation of the different phases. Finally, we took a closer look at the global conversational structure of explanations by applying a context-sensitive model of organizational jobs, thus adding a third layer of analysis. Results show that in our small sample of conversational explanations, both monological and dialogical phases varied in their length, timing of occurrence (at the early or later stages of the interaction) and their initiation (by the explainer or the explainee). They alternated several times in the course of the interaction. However, we also found some patterns suggesting that all interactions started with a monological phase initiated by the explainer. Both conversational partners contributed to the core organizational job that constitutes an explanation. We interpret the results as an indication for naturally occurring everyday explanations in doctor–patient interactions to be co-constructed on three levels of linguistic description: (1) by switching back and forth between monological to dialogical phases that (2) can be initiated by both partners and (3) by the mutual accomplishment and thus responsibility for an explanation’s core job that is crucial for the success of the explanation. Because of the explorative nature of our study, these results need to be investigated (a) with a larger sample and (b) in other contexts. However, our results suggest that future designs of artificial explainable systems should design the explanatory dialogue in such a way that it includes monological and dialogical phases that can be initiated not only by the explainer but also by the explainee, as both contribute to the core job of explicating procedural, clausal, or conceptual relations in explanations.}}, author = {{Fisher, Josephine Beryl and Lohmer, Vivien and Kern, Friederike and Barthlen, Winfried and Gaus, Sebastian and Rohlfing, Katharina}}, issn = {{0933-1875}}, journal = {{KI - Künstliche Intelligenz}}, keywords = {{Artificial Intelligence}}, number = {{3-4}}, pages = {{317--326}}, publisher = {{Springer Science and Business Media LLC}}, title = {{{Exploring monological and dialogical phases in naturally occurring explanations}}}, doi = {{10.1007/s13218-022-00787-1}}, volume = {{36}}, year = {{2022}}, } @article{24456, abstract = {{One objective of current research in explainable intelligent systems is to implement social aspects in order to increase the relevance of explanations. In this paper, we argue that a novel conceptual framework is needed to overcome shortcomings of existing AI systems with little attention to processes of interaction and learning. Drawing from research in interaction and development, we first outline the novel conceptual framework that pushes the design of AI systems toward true interactivity with an emphasis on the role of the partner and social relevance. We propose that AI systems will be able to provide a meaningful and relevant explanation only if the process of explaining is extended to active contribution of both partners that brings about dynamics that is modulated by different levels of analysis. Accordingly, our conceptual framework comprises monitoring and scaffolding as key concepts and claims that the process of explaining is not only modulated by the interaction between explainee and explainer but is embedded into a larger social context in which conventionalized and routinized behaviors are established. We discuss our conceptual framework in relation to the established objectives of transparency and autonomy that are raised for the design of explainable AI systems currently.}}, author = {{Rohlfing, Katharina J. and Cimiano, Philipp and Scharlau, Ingrid and Matzner, Tobias and Buhl, Heike M. and Buschmeier, Hendrik and Esposito, Elena and Grimminger, Angela and Hammer, Barbara and Haeb-Umbach, Reinhold and Horwath, Ilona and Hüllermeier, Eyke and Kern, Friederike and Kopp, Stefan and Thommes, Kirsten and Ngonga Ngomo, Axel-Cyrille and Schulte, Carsten and Wachsmuth, Henning and Wagner, Petra and Wrede, Britta}}, issn = {{2379-8920}}, journal = {{IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and Developmental Systems}}, keywords = {{Explainability, process ofexplaining andunderstanding, explainable artificial systems}}, number = {{3}}, pages = {{717--728}}, title = {{{Explanation as a Social Practice: Toward a Conceptual Framework for the Social Design of AI Systems}}}, doi = {{10.1109/tcds.2020.3044366}}, volume = {{13}}, year = {{2021}}, } @article{28696, abstract = {{The aim of the present study is to bring new momentum into research on students’ understanding of academic writing. Drawing on the idea that metaphors give insight into implicit conceptions of abstract entities and processes, we developed a detailed and differentiated set of conceptual metaphors that can be used to study student ideas about writing in research, teaching, and interventions. A large sample of undergraduates produced their everyday understanding of writing in short texts beginning with a self-generated metaphor. Based on theories from cognitive linguistics, the conceptual metaphors in their texts were analyzed in terms of their action quality (transitivity) and spatiality (spatial primitives). The undergraduates’ conceptualizations were very heterogeneous. Most metaphors depart strongly from scientific approaches to academic writing within cognitive psychology and sociocultural theory. Roughly half of the metaphors could be collated to one of four metaphor systems. Depending on the desired degree of abstraction or concreteness, conceptual metaphors or metaphor systems can be employed in further studies to illuminate thinking about writing.}}, author = {{Scharlau, Ingrid and Karsten, Andrea and Rohlfing, Katharina}}, issn = {{2030-1006}}, journal = {{Journal of Writing Research}}, keywords = {{metaphor analysis, academic writing, transitivity, spatial primitives}}, number = {{3}}, pages = {{493--529}}, title = {{{Building, emptying out, or dreaming? Action structures and space in undergraduates’ metaphors of academic writing}}}, doi = {{10.17239/jowr-2021.12.03.01}}, volume = {{12}}, year = {{2021}}, } @article{31680, author = {{Scharlau, Ingrid and Karsten, A. and Rohlfing, Katharina J.}}, issn = {{2030-1006}}, journal = {{Journal of Writing Research}}, keywords = {{Literature and Literary Theory, Linguistics and Language, Language and Linguistics, Education}}, number = {{vol. 12 issue 3}}, pages = {{493--529}}, publisher = {{ARLE (International Association for Research in L1 Education)}}, title = {{{Building, emptying out, or dreaming? Action structures and space in students’ metaphors of academic writing}}}, doi = {{10.17239/jowr-2021.12.03.01}}, volume = {{12}}, year = {{2021}}, } @article{37185, abstract = {{Social robots have emerged as a new digital technology that is increasingly being implemented in the educational landscape. While social robots could be deployed to assist young children with their learning in a variety of different ways, the typical approach in educational practices is to supplement the learning process rather than to replace the human caregiver, e.g., the teacher, parent, educator or therapist. When functioning in the role of an educational assistant, social robots will likely constitute a part of a triadic interaction with the child and the human caregiver. Surprisingly, there is little research that systematically investigates the role of the caregiver by examining the ways in which children involve or check in with them during their interaction with another partner—a phenomenon that is known as social referencing. In the present study, we investigated social referencing in the context of a dyadic child–robot interaction. Over the course of four sessions within our longitudinal language-learning study, we observed how 20 pre-school children aged 4–5 years checked in with their accompanying caregivers who were not actively involved in the language-learning procedure. The children participating in the study were randomly assigned to either an interaction with a social robot or a human partner. Our results revealed that all children across both conditions utilized social referencing behaviors to address their caregiver. However, we found that the children who interacted with the social robot did so significantly more frequently in each of the four sessions than those who interacted with the human partner. Further analyses showed that no significant change in their behavior over the course of the sessions could be observed. Findings are discussed with regard to the caregiver's role during children's interactions with social robots and the implications for future interaction design.}}, author = {{Tolksdorf, Nils F. and Crawshaw, Camilla E. and Rohlfing, Katharina}}, issn = {{2504-284X}}, journal = {{Frontiers in Education}}, keywords = {{Education}}, publisher = {{Frontiers Media SA}}, title = {{{Comparing the Effects of a Different Social Partner (Social Robot vs. Human) on Children's Social Referencing in Interaction}}}, doi = {{10.3389/feduc.2020.569615}}, volume = {{5}}, year = {{2021}}, } @article{37184, author = {{Rohlfing, Katharina and Mertens, Ulrich}}, journal = {{Frontiers in Psychology}}, title = {{{Progressive Reduction of Iconic Gestures Contributes to School-Aged Children’s Increased Word Production}}}, doi = {{10.3389/fpsyg.2021.651725}}, year = {{2021}}, }