Sara Rine is one of these students. Her belief that Social Robotics will be the future combined with her interest in the communicative bridge between humans and robots is what made her decide to take this course. Whereas the first half of the master's focuses on communicative issues in PR and marketing, this course applies these issues to robots. "It seemed very interesting to me to apply social skills in a field where the focus is primarily on technology and not on communication. This while these social skills are also very essential for effective communication in robots".
She explains that the subject is laid out very differently than she was used to. This made the subject interesting and innovative as well as challenging. The course is organized in such a way that each week has its own theme in which the students go through each step of creating a 'social robot'. For example, in the first week the student is observing interactions between robot and human and then applying the observed behaviors to both new and already existing theories. "This course provides a perfect balance between both scientific communicative theories and practical issues", Sara says. She is very appreciative of the course and she has learned a lot.
Consequently, her enthusiasm about the subject manifested itself in her master's thesis. For her thesis, she got to conduct experiments using social robots. She investigated whether social robots are able to reduce stress among students. "After writing my thesis, I was still very fascinated about this topic. This is why I chose to do a PhD in Social Robotics!". Good luck with your further career in this field, Sara!
