emo37-IRB+proposal


 * PROJECT DESCRIPTION:**

Using anthropomorphic robots for treating people with schizophrenia = = = = =**Summary**=
 * __Title:__**

This study is a theoretical and empirical study of the emerging scientific field of Social Robotic. Social Robotic aims to understand the human robot interactions not just in industrial sectors but also in everyday life of people. Reviewing these interactions requires interdisciplinary collaboration among a wide range of social scientists and engineers since it involves research problems beyond the narrow specializations of any one scientific or social scientist discipline. New advanced technologies, humanoid robots in particular -- for psychological functions, for example – have changed the nature of studies in robotic engineers in recent years to studying the mutual interactions of robots and humans in everyday life. This paradigm shift has created new collaborative and methodological challenges in studying robotic technologies. The key analytic goal is to understand how interdisciplinary practices are being forged, sustained and evaluated in the socio robotic and psychological practices to treat individuals with psychological disorders.

Empirical material for this study will be collected through interviews with socio robotic scholars, robotic technology engineers and psychiatrists; I will prepare the materials for the multi sited ethnography of socio robotic and schizophrenia in USA and Japan by a set of questions and examples which will be produced by the literature review. Approximately 60 interviews will be conducted, 15 interviews with socio robotic and robotic engineers in USA, 15 with Japanese scholars, 10 with psychiatrics in Japan and 10 USA, 5 interviews with families and community members of schizophrenic patients and 5 interviews with 5 schizophrenic patient in USA and Japan. All will be conducted by face to face interviews, either at the interviewee’s home institution or at meetings or conferences that we will attend. Interviews will be partly or completely transcribed. The transcripts will be returned to the interviewee for editing and approval before they are analyzed and direct quotations excerpted. In order to reach the main goal of this research, the psychiatric functions of humanoid robots, I will do a field observation of social and communication interactions of schizophrenic patients with humanoid robots for at least a 6 month period to examine the functions of humanoid robots on treatment of social and emotional conditions of schizophrenic patients. I will choose 2 schizophrenic patients, one male and another one a female patient to review also the role of gender in interactions with robots. A series of questions which will link the primary aims of the study to the empirical data of the field observation, information gathered by the interviews and particular themes of the STS literatures will help me to analyze data. So at the first stage, interviews will be analyzed and then based on data of the interviews, I will start conducting the field observation. By the data analysis of this observation and interviews, I will examine my hypotheses based on STS theories. Findings will be published as a book, and in journals such as //American Ethnologist// and //Social Studies of Science//.


 * __RESPONSE TO IRB QUESTIONS__**

1. Title of Proposal: “Using anthropomorphic robots for treating people with schizophrenia ”

2. Principal Investigator: Tahereh Saheb

3. Address: Sage 5704

4. Phone: 518-268-9583

5. N/A

6. Department: Science and Technology Studies

7. Objective: This theoretical and empirical study will document and analyze the emerging field of socio robotic, conducting in-depth ethnographic interviews with psychologists, socio robotic scholars and robotic engineers to understand new directions in socio robotic research.

8. Methods: Approximately 60 in-depth interviews, 15 interviews with socio robotic and robotic engineers in USA, 15 with Japanese scholars, 10 with psychiatrics in Japan and 10 USA, 5 interviews with families and community members of schizophrenic patients and 5 interviews with 5 schizophrenic patient in USA and Japan will be conducted for this study. Interview subjects will be recruited through email messages that describe the aims and methods of the project, and include a copy of the project’s informed consent form.

9. Effects on the subjects: There will be minimal physical effects on the subjects because they will be interviewed

10. Measures to minimize risk: All interviews will be voluntary. Interviewees will be given the opportunity to be anonymous, to stop the interview at any point, or to retract the interview or parts of it before publication.

The tape of the interview will be stored on the computers of Tahereh Saheb as password protected (128-bit) encrypted files, and will not be shared with anyone except for the advisor. I will consider all transcripts strictly confidential, and will destroy all copies of the interview once the transcription has been written. Once a digital text file, the transcript will be stored on the computers of Tahereh Saheb, again with password protection and encryption. All hard copies of the transcript will be stored in the offices of Tahereh Saheb, which are locked when she is not present. Only Tahereh Saheb and her advisor will have access to both electronic and hard copies of transcribed interviews. All copies of the interview (recorded and transcribed) will be destroyed at any time on the request of the interviewee.

This is detailed in the attached informed consent form for interviews

11. Likelihood of harm: Minimal.

12. Documentation of risks: None.

13. Benefits to participants: Participants in this study will directly and indirectly benefit from the results of the data. Results of the study will be presented to psychologists, STS scholars, social robotics in particular and robotic engineers and also to decision-makers responsible for funding and using humanoid robots research.

14. Alternative Method not Using Human Subjects: None possible.

Qualifications of Researchers: Tahereh Saheb is a PhD student in Science Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

15. Recruiting of subjects: Interview subjects will be contacted directly, informed of the purposes of the interview, and given the opportunity to refuse the interview.

17. Confidentiality: The participants will be given the opportunity to define the extent to which their names will be associated with any (or all) statement(s) during the interview, and will be given the right to retract any statement at any time prior to publication of research results. Any statements that participants designate as “off the record” will not be attributed to the participant, nor used in a way that would link their statement to said participant. As is codified in the Informed Consent Form, I will use any such comments only as background information, and will not quote them in either an attributed or unattributed fashion in any of my future work.

18. Specimen of Consent Form: Please see attached “Informed Consent Form.”

19. Preliminary Interview Guide is also attached below.

Contact information for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Review Board: Chair, Institutional Review Board, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, CII 7015, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180
 * __INFORMED CONSENT FORM__**
 * An interdisciplinary research on studying the psychological functions of humanoid robots **
 * Tahereh Saheb, Department of Science and Technology Studies **
 * Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute / Troy, NY 12180 (518-268-9583) / **** sahebt@rpi.edu **

This interview with __is being conducted as part of an interdisciplinary study of psychological functions of humanoid robots. The research will result in public talks, articles, and a book. The interview will be recorded on tape, with the following conditions:__ __ 1. Your participation in this interview is voluntary. You may terminate the interview at any time during our conversation. The interview will last approximately two hours. 2. You may ask that the tape be turned off at any time during this interview, and I will turn the tape off. 3. You may designate any comments you make on the tape as “off the record.” You may also designate comments as “off the record” retrospectively, either at a later point in the interview or in the process of approving the transcript. I promise to use such comments only as background information, and will not quote them in either an attributed or unattributed fashion in any of my future work. 4. I will transcribe the tape in part or in full. I will submit any such full or partial transcript to you for your approval. You will be free to edit, clarify, amend, or delete any part of the transcript before returning it to me, having made a copy of the transcript and any changes you make to it for your own files. 5. I will be free to quote from this approved transcript, and only this approved transcript, in my future work. The tape itself will not be made public in any fashion, and can also be destroyed if you so request. The transcript of the interview will not be made public unless you explicitly approve a request to do so. 6. The tape of the interview will be stored on the computers of Tahereh Saheb as password protected (128-bit) encrypted files, and will not be shared with anyone except for my advisor. All transcripts strictly confidential, and I will destroy all copies of the interview once the transcription has been completed. Once as a digital text file, the transcript will be stored on the computers of Tahereh Saheb, again with password protection and encryption. All hard copies of the transcript will be stored in the offices of either Tahereh Saheb, which are locked when she is not present. Only Tahereh Saheb and her advisor will have access to both electronic and hard copies of transcribed interviews. All copies of the interview (recorded and transcribed) will be destroyed at any time on the request of the interviewee. 7. You have the right to remain anonymous, and can do so by initializing here: ___. If you do not choose to remain anonymous, in quoting from the approved transcript in my future work, I may attribute remarks directly to you, but will not necessarily do so. 8. If you have any additional conditions that you would like to add, write them here and they will be considered part of this agreement:

Additional Conditions:

Finally, if for any reason you change your mind about this interview or any of these conditions in the future, I promise to respect any request that you make to me. I will not be able to retract anything that is already in print or in press based on the approved transcript, but I will honor any future request to change any of the terms of this agreement, up to and including complete retraction of the interview and permission to quote from it. INTERVIEWER INTERVIEWEE date: address _ _ phone _ email _ || o What are the treatment methods of schizophrenia? What elements are affecting the effectiveness of each method? o How much effective is medical and psychiatric treatment? o How schizophrenia affect patients’ social and communication relations? o What are the psychotherapy functions of social relationships in the lives schizophrenic patients and their families? o What are the roles of family, friend and community in social and emotional support of schizophrenic patients? o How strength is the social network of schizophrenic patients with their families? o What are the obstacles of schizophrenic patients’ social relationships with society? o What are the reasons of social isolation of schizophrenic patients? o What are the appropriate and desired forms of communication with schizophrenic patients? o What are individuals’ with mental illnesses and their family member’s perceptions of various personal losses due to mental illnesses? || o In which areas- for example industrial, medical, psychological etc, robotic technologies have been used most? o Why robotic technologies have progressed in some areas so rapidly and in other areas so slowly? What are the barriers? o What are the advantages and disadvantages of anthropomorphous robots? o When does socio robotic field emerge? o What are recent discoveries of humanoid robots in psychology? o Can developments in socio robotic help individuals with cognitive and social problems because of their psychological disorders to overcome the difficulties of developing social relationships? o Can humanoid robots provide a tangible assistance and emotional support for the individuals with schizophrenia? o What are anthropomorphic robots? o What is the global tendency toward designing and programming anthropomorphous robots? o What are advantages and disadvantages of anthropomorphous robots? o Can we design and program an anthropomorphous robot based on the customer’s orders? In our case, can we program a anthropomorphic robot appropriate for recovering social and emotional condition of a schizophrenic patient? o How can we strengthen the tendency of schizophrenic patients toward communicating with a humanoid robot? o What are the barriers of human robot interactions? ||
 * PRELIMINARY INTERVIEW GUIDE**
 * Aim 1. To understand the psychological functions of humanoid robots on treating schizophrenic patients
 * Q.1. How severe psychological disorders affect patients’ life? || o What are the symptoms of schizophrenia?
 * Q.2. How can advance technology help treating severe psychological disorders? || o What are the reasons of robotic technologies growth?