A robot has been taught to laugh at jokes in a bid to make it more human.
Researchers at Kyoto University in Japan are using artificial intelligence (AI) to train robots about appropriate laughter – and to differentiate between chuckles and rip-roaring squeals. Writing in the journal Frontiers in Robotics and AI, they describe working with a robot called Erica with the hope of making conversations more natural.
“We think that one of the important functions of conversational AI is empathy,” said lead author Dr Koji Inoue, an assistant professor at Kyoto University in the Department of Intelligence Science and Technology. “Conversation is, of course, multimodal, not just responding correctly.
