An emotion-based approach to robotics

Abstract

We describe a different approach to robotics in which emotions are at center-stage playing a much larger role than just that of facilitating emotional expression. Drawing inspiration from work in psychology, neuroscience, and ethology, we have developed a computational framework that captures important aspects of emotional processing and integrates these with other models of perception, attention, motivation, behavior, and motor control. We have followed this approach to control several autonomous agents, including a physical robot that is capable of emotional expression while exhibiting robust and effective behavior.