Rahatul Amin Ananto

About

I am a PhD Candidate in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department in McGill University. I completed my Master's in Computer Science from the University of Manitoba. I did my Bachelors in Science in Computer Science and Engineering from BRAC University, Bangladesh.

I have always been fascinated by robotics, mainly the social aspects of robotics. We call this human-robot interaction (HRI) where we explore different situations where a robot may need to interact with humans in a collaborative way. During my Master's I worked on a project with a robotic dog named AIBO, where I explored if people are ready to accept such a robotic dog in their everyday lives and if the robot helps them psychologically if they are lonely. This project can be found below in the projects section.

For my PhD, I am exploring how we may define social appropriateness in Human-Robot Interaction. When we interact with another human, there is a subconscious association of appropriateness that we try to maintain. This appropriateness includes social norms that are supported on the basis of culture, age, gender, and other social factors too. I am exploring if such social aspects are also valid during an interaction with a social robot or a telepresence robot. 

Projects

Publications

Can Robots Help with Loneliness? An Exploration of Social Robot Adoption by Lonely Individuals

Rahatul Amin Ananto. Can Robots Help with Loneliness? An Exploration of Social Robot Adoption by Lonely Individuals. MSc Thesis (2022). University of Manitoba, Canada.

We Can Do Better! An Initial Survey Highlighting an Opportunity for More HRI Work on Loneliness

Rahatul A. Ananto, James E. Young. 2021. We Can Do Better! An Initial Survey Highlighting an Opportunity for More HRI Work on Loneliness. In the Companion of 2021 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human Robot Interaction (HRI’21), March 8–11, 2021, Boulder, CO, USA. ACM, New York, NY, USA. 6 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3434074.3447213

Robot Pets for Everyone: The Untapped Potential for Domestic Social Robots

Rahatul A. Ananto, James E. Young, “Robot Pets for Everyone: The Untapped Potential for Domestic Social Robots.” In Proceedings of the 29th International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN 2020 WORKSHOP ON SOCIAL HUMAN-ROBOT INTERACTION OF HUMAN-CARE SERVICE ROBOTS). 2020.

Domestic Robots for Individuals Living with Loneliness: A Long-Term In-Home Interaction Study Design

Rahatul A. Ananto, Geiskkovitch, D.Y., James E. Young. 2020. Domestic Robots for Individuals Living with Loneliness: A Long-Term In-Home Interaction Study Design. In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction (HAI '20), Australia. ACM, 2 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3406499.3418749

My Photography