Koen V. Hindriks

I am a Full Professor Artificial Intelligence at the Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam. I have been an academic for most of my life but also worked as a project manager at Accenture. My research on Artificial Intelligence is aimed at making robots more social by using psychological insights on human intuition and reasoning (Dual Process Theory) and applying and developing cognitive agent technology. On August 24, 2016, I launched the spinoff company Interactive Robotics, developing a unique social interaction architecture for controlling social robots and robots for in the classroom, for teaching children the possibilities as well as limits of current robot technology. I have developed robots as companions and assistants for healthcare and education, and service robots for business solutions.

Socially Intelligent Systems

My research is about making robots more social and able to interact with us more naturally. I use cognitive agent technology, and Dual Process Theory and the Systems 1 and 2 interpretation of Daniel Kahneman on human intuition and reasoning as a guideline for developing (engineering) socially-aware and socially interactive machines. The challenge is to design a Social Interaction Architecture (SIA) for a generic Personal Interactive Assistant (PIA)

Systems 1 and 2

Abstract Social Interaction Architecture

The Hypothesis is that abstract 2-layered interaction architectures which symbolically represent interaction elements that humans have cognitive access to provides for increased re-usability and flexible interaction.

News

Started as Full Professor AI at VU

November 1

I've started as Full Professor Artificial Intelligence at the Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam. Looking forward to work together with my new colleagues!

NOS Journaal about Robot Sophia

September 28

Robot Sophia visited the Netherlands and NOS Journal did an item on her and an interview with me. You can read and view the item here.

Robots helpen zieke kinderen

July 25

Onze projecten met het Prinses Maxima Centrum en het Ziekenhuis Gelderse Vallei in het Jeugdjournaal. Je kunt het item hier terugkijken.

Best Paper New Friends Conference

June 29

Mike, Mark and me received the best paper award for our paper Child-Robot Interaction: The Importance of Getting Acquainted at the New Friends Conference in Panama.

Publications

Primary Literature

I actively maintain an overview of My Publications on My ResearchGate profile. For impact (e.g., H-index, citations) of my research, check out My Google Scholar profile. I obtained My PhD Degree February 5, 2001, at 16:15 for My PhD Thesis Agent Programming Languages: Programming with Mental Models, which you can find here, from my supervisors John-Jules Ch. Meyer, Frank S. de Boer, and Wiebe van der Hoek.

I also keep track of My Academic Talks and Presentations (select the Presentation item to see an overview) on My ResearchGate profile.

Software

Open Source

I strongly believe that scientific research in computer science should also result in prototypes and software systems that can be reused in academy as well as in industry. You can find an overview of My Open Source Software projects on GitHub and Bitbucket. Check out My Cognitive Agent Programming Language GOAL for programming strategic decision making agents which we have used for controlling social robots and for creating bots for StarCraft. GOAL enables the programming of cognitive agents that derive their choice of action (decisions) from their beliefs and goals, similar to how we make practical decisions.

Education

Storytelling, discussing, teaching, training

You can find the courses I teach and have taught on My ResearchGate profile. Looking for a MSc Thesis subject on cognitive agents, social robots, or social interaction with machines, in games, healthcare, or somewhere else, contact me here.

Contact

Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam

Department of Artificial Intelligence

Boelelaan 1081, 1081 HV Amsterdam

The Netherlands

k.v.hindriks@vu.nl

phone: +31 20 59 87763

Room T335

ORCID: 0000-0002-5707-5236