Paper Reading #2: Early Explorations of CAT: Canine Amusement and Training

Commentary

See what I have to say about Evin's and Paola's work.

References

Wingrave, C. A., et al. (2010). Early explorations of cat: canine amusement and training. Proceeding of the Acm conference on human factors in computing systems (pp. 2661-2669). Atlanta: http://www.sigchi.org/chi2010/.

Article Summary

Wingrave and his associates work in the field of CHCI, or Canine-Human-Computer-Interaction, in order to create an environment for meaningful interaction between humans and their canine companions using the help of computers. The system they created was designed to be used as an aid to effective canine training and also to teach the human how to develop appropriate habits for training and for play.

The proof of concept designed by the team comprised the setup of the system and three games: some basic training commands, a tag game, and a chase game. The system used Wiimotes from Nintendo to track canine movement and a combined TV-projector display (TV for the humans, projector pointed towards the floor for the dogs). Their initial results were reviewed by an animal training specialist, who gave them some insight as to the effects of both the games and the human participation on the dogs.

The team then altered the system to correct minor design flaws and developed new games that would provide a more efficacious training environment for the dogs: the new games focused on keeping both humans and dogs calm in various scenarios. Dogs learned to stay with and come to their owners, and to be placed in various locations in which they would stay.

The team is currently continuing to evaluate the responses of humans and canines alike to various changes in the system to provide a fun, usable system for CHCI. Their future plans include training tips based on observed human and canine behavior, the possibility of collaborative play, and eventually the distribution of this system on a widespread scale.

Discussion

I loved this article. As the new owner a very young, very small dog who came from a shelter, I definitely understand the necessity for meaningful interaction between man and his best friend. My dog, Marvin, is still skittish when there's a lot of excitement going on, doesn't like other humans very much, and doesn't respond well to my training attempts (granted, I haven't taken to time that I don't have anyway to do any serious training). This isn't to say that I've given up on him, but I imagine a system like this could do wonders to help the both of us understand each other better. This isn't the first attempt at incorporating animals into computer games to some degree of reasonable facsimile for the purposes of learning and training:

Image courtesy of IGN

But I think it's pretty revolutionary to extend the field of HCI to CHCI. At the same time, I think that users should take as much care with monitoring their pets' game time as they should their own children. I mean, we all know that these sorts of things can get out of hand:

Image courtesy of Fort 90