Distortion-based interface design for sustainable robotic therapy

康复机器人领域解决残疾人及其照顾者在身体、情感和认知方面的健康功能需求。作为家庭帮手和生活延长者，机器人已经被证明可以提高生活质量，并在日常生活活动中允许更多的个人独立性。通过需求驱动的设计、商用服务机器人的新用途以及传感技术、控制和认知工程领域(如视觉、抓取和路径规划)科学进步的应用，该领域正在稳步推进。然而，包括机器人在内的治疗设备的使用中一直存在的一个问题是，需要治疗的人缺乏持续的动力。当残疾导致依赖和制度化时，遵守和放弃培训的减少就会转化为财政和社会成本。密集而昂贵的一对一个人治疗表明，功能恢复可以得到显著改善；然而，患者必须忍受长期的挫折，才能实现真正的收获。在治疗的成果实现之前，这个人会放弃吗？至关重要的是，我们要设计出行之有效的解决方案。 对适当、及时和个性化的持续激励反馈的明确需求转化为未来机器人解决方案的目标规范：它们必须具有响应性，适应用户的影响，并针对所需的治疗进行设计。该项目将探索利用生理信号监测来提高使用治疗机电设备的人的动机，以改善功能。最初将进行实验，以在机器人使用期间实时结合隐式(影响)措施和显式(性能的运动学测量)，然后在康复环境中评估这些类型的反馈在为使用机器人进行物理治疗的人创造适应性、参与性和激励性体验方面的有效性。

The field of Rehabilitation Robotics addresses functional needs in the well-being - physical, emotional and cognitive - of persons with disabilities and their caregivers. As household helpers and life extenders, robots have been demonstrated to improve quality of life and allow more personal independence in performing activities of daily living. The field is advancing steadily through needs-driven design, new uses of commercial service robots and the application of scientific advances in sensing technologies, controls, and cognitive engineering fields such as vision, grasping, and path-planning. Nevertheless, a persistent thread in the use of therapy devices, including robots, remains the lack of sustained motivation by people who need the therapy. Reduced compliance and abandonment of training translate to financial and societal costs when disability results in dependency and institutionalization. Intensive and expensive one-on-one personal therapy has shown that functional recovery can be significantly improved; however, the patient must endure a long period of frustration before true gains are realized. Will the person give up before the fruits of the therapy are realized? It is critical that we design solutions that work. The clear need for continual motivational feedback that is appropriate, timely and personalized translates to a target specification for future robotic solutions: They must be responsive, adaptive to user affect and designed for the therapy needed. This program will explore the use of physiological signal monitoring to improve the motivation of persons using therapy mechatronic devices to improve function. Experiments will initially be conducted to combine implicit (affect) measures and explicit (kinematic measures of performance) in real-time during robot use, and then in a rehabilitation setting to evaluate the effectiveness of these types of feedback in creating an adaptive, engaging, motivational experience for persons undergoing physical therapy using a robot.