My recent work in developmental and social robotics focuses on sensorimotor development and its interaction with early language development: Can a robot learn like a child ? How can we build robots that can learn a variety of novel reusable skills in initially unknown environments, either throuh autonomous and spontaneous exploration or through interaction with social peers? How can language be discovered and learnt through natural interaction with humans? In this research, concepts from developmental psychology are imported, formalized and implemented in robots. The central hypothesis is that open-ended learning in the real-world can only happen when strong developmental constraints allow to guide the exploration and acquisition of skills. My approach is thus to study various families of constraints essential in human development and apply them to robot development and learning: intrinsic motivation and artificial curiosity, maturational processes, morphological computation and embodiment, social constraints related to joint attention and joint intention understanding, perceptual and motor primitives, self-organization.

In previous years, I have also used robots to study how new linguistic conventions can be established in a society of individuals, as well as the mechanisms of language acquisition. There is a double objective: 1) contributing to the understanding of the acquisition and evolution of language(s) (see my book), 2) developing new technological approaches for building intelligent sociable robots.

 

 

 

My publications on Google Scholar

 

Selected publications on:

Developmental robotics, intrinsic motivation, and artificial curiosity:

Oudeyer P-Y, Kaplan , F. and Hafner, V. (2007) Intrinsic Motivation Systems for Autonomous Mental Development, IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation, 11(2), pp. 265--286. DOI: 10.1109/TEVC.2006.890271. (html)

Oudeyer P-Y., Kaplan F. (2006) Discovering Communication, Connection Science, 18(2), pp. 189--206.

Epistemology and history on the impact of robotics in cognitive sciences:

Oudeyer, P-Y. (2011) Developmental Robotics, Encyclopedia of the Sciences of Learning, N.M. Seel ed., Springer Reference Series, Springer.

Oudeyer, P-Y. (2010) On the impact of robotics in behavioral and cognitive sciences: from insect navigation to human cognitive development, IEEE Transactions on Autonomous Mental Development, 2(1), pp. 2--16. DOI: 10.1109/TAMD.2009.2039057 

Self-organization, complex-systems and the origins of speech:

Oudeyer, P-Y. (2006) Self-Organization in the Evolution of Speech, Studies in the Evolution of Language, Oxford University Press. (Translation by James R. Hurford)

Oudeyer, P-Y. (2005) The Self-Organization of Speech Sounds, Journal of Theoretical Biology,  233(3), pp. 435--449. (html)  

The origins of combinatoriality and phonotactics in speech:

Oudeyer, P-Y. (2005) The self-organization of combinatoriality and phonotactics in vocalization systems, Connection Science, 17(3-4), pp. 325--341  

Language evolution conceptualized as a cultural Darwinian process:

Oudeyer, P-Y. and Kaplan, F. (2007) Language Evolution as a Darwinian Process: Computational Studies, Cognitive Processing, 8(1), pp. 21--35. DOI: 10.1007/s10339-006-0158-3

Language acquisition, cognitive development and learnability:

Kaplan, F., Oudeyer, P-Y., Bergen B. (2008) Computational Models in the Debate over Language Learnability, Infant and Child Development, 17(1), pp. 55--80.

Oudeyer, P-Y (2005) How phonological structures can be culturally selected for learnability, Adaptive Behavior, 13(4), pp. 269--280.

Oudeyer P-Y., Kaplan F. (2006) Discovering Communication, Connection Science, 18(2), pp. 189--206.

Emotional speech synthesis and recognition:

Oudeyer P-Y. (2003) The production and recognition of emotions in speech: features and algorithms, International Journal in Human-Computer Studies, 59(1-2), pp. 157--183, special issue on Affective Computing. 

Robot behavioral shaping:

Kaplan, F., Oudeyer, P-Y., Kubinyi, E. and Miklosi, A. (2002) Robotic clicker training. Robotics and Autonomous Systems, 38(3-4), pp. 197--206.

Interaction of maturation, body growth and curiosity-driven learning

Baranes, A., Oudeyer, P-Y. (2011) The Interaction of Maturational Constraints and Intrinsic Motivations in Active Motor Development, in proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Development and Learning, Frankfurt, Germany.

  more papers ...

 

NEWS: Keynotes talks about the main challenges of developmental robotics I made in 2011 in the following conferences: Robolift 2011, IEEE Alife 2011 and AAMAS 2011 

NEWS: FLOWERS' Acroban humanoid robot has being featured in live demonstration at Siggraph 2010 Emerging technologies in Los Angeles. It is a lightweight compliant humanoid robot capable of robust semi-passive dynamic locomotion, life-like movements, and offers the possibility of a new kind of playful physical human-robot interaction. We developed this platform, which initial design was made by Olivier Ly, to explore how morphological constraints can simplify the developmental acquisition of complex sensorimotor skills, as well as to explore novel kinds of human-robot interaction.

Acroban results from the collaboration between INRIA and University of Bordeaux I/Labri.

More information on http://flowers.inria.fr/acroban.php

See also our new Inria FLOWERS Youtube Channel.

Together with Manuel Lopes, I have guest edited in 2010 a special issue on active learning and intrinsically motivated exploration in robots for the IEEE Transactions on Autonomous Mental Development journal.

 

I am editor of the IEEE CIS Newsletter on Autonomous Mental Development. The latest issue includes a dialog on Intrinsically Motivated Learning in robots.

 

 

I was program co-chair of the 9th International Conference on Epigenetic Robotics: Modeling Cognitive Development in Robotic Systems (2009), which took place in Venice, Italy.