Welcome to the April 2020 SIGCHI edition of ACM TechNews.

ACM TechNews - SIGCHI Edition is a sponsored special edition of the ACM TechNews news-briefing service focused on issues in Human Computer Interaction (HCI). This service serves as a resource for ACM-SIGCHI Members to keep abreast of the latest news in areas related to HCI and is distributed to all ACM SIGCHI members the first Tuesday of every month. ACM TechNews is a benefit of ACM membership and is distributed three times per week on Mondays, Wednesday, and Fridays to over 100,000 ACM members from over 100 countries around the world. ACM TechNews provides timely coverage of established and emerging areas of computer science, the latest trends in information technology, and related science, society, and technology news. For more information on ACM TechNews and joining the ACM, please click. The Interactions mobile app is available for free on iOS, Android, and Kindle platforms. Download it today and flip through the full-color magazine pages on your tablet or view it in a simplified low-bandwidth text mode on your phone. And be sure to check out the Interactions website, where you can access current and past articles and read the latest entries in our ever-expanding collection of blogs.

Tommy the Robot Nurse Helps Keep Italy Doctors Safe From Coronavirus
Reuters
Flavio Lo Scalzo
April 1, 2020

Circolo Hospital in Varese, a city in the Lombardy region of Italy, is using six robots to help human medical professionals care for coronavirus patients. The child-size robots have large, blinking eyes, and are left by a patient's bedside so doctors can look after others who need more attention. The robots monitor information from equipment in the room, and relay it to hospital staff. Each robot is equipped with a touchscreen face that allows patients to record messages and send them to doctors. The use of the robots help the hospital limit the amount of direct contact doctors and nurses have with coronavirus patients, reducing the risk of infection.

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Doctors Urge Patients to Replace In-Person Visits With Apps
The Washington Post
Geoffrey A. Fowler; Laurie McGinley
March 19, 2020

Telehealth apps are gaining in popularity as the first line of defense among healthcare providers to slow the spread of the coronavirus and focus care and limited supplies on the most urgent cases. Selfie cameras and cellular data connections on smartphones are all patients need to connect with their doctors for a checkup. Teledoc and other primary care apps already are accessible to tens of millions of Americans through their insurance and employers, and more than 50 major U.S. health systems have telemedicine programs. Through webcam visits, doctors can question patients about symptoms and look at certain parts of the body; doctors say they also can learn a lot from seeing a patient’s body language.

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How Teachers Moved the Classroom Online Overnight
The Wall Street Journal
Leslie Brody; Lee Hawkins
March 31, 2020

New York City's school district, the largest in the country, recently had a crash course in remote learning due to the coronavirus outbreak. The district is not alone, as Education Week reports that closures have affected at least 124,000 public and private schools and more than 55 million students nationwide. In New York City, many teachers were forced to shift online nearly overnight despite little training in using digital platforms. Now they are posting videos of lectures and assignments online, holding class discussions via Google hangouts, and hosting virtual "office hours." Meanwhile, some educators have stressed the difference between being digital consumers and digital learners, as many students now have to use for schoolwork devices they mainly used for movies and games before. There also are concerns that remote learning will worsen achievement gaps between children who have stable housing, technology, effective teachers, and parents able to help, and those who do not.

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Video Games Can Be a Healthy Social Pastime During Coronavirus Pandemic
USA Today
Mike Snider
March 28, 2020

Video game makers including Activision Blizzard and Zynga kicked off the #PlayApartTogether initiative, which encourages players to stay distanced and observe hand hygiene and other safety measures to help stop the spread of COVID-19, while also providing a diversion amid ongoing stay-at-home directives across the U.S. Developers and publishers are not only enhancing games but also encouraging people to learn to develop games themselves. Unity Technologies, for instance, is making its Unity Learn Premium game development platform free for three months, and Riot Games offers a free online game design curriculum for middle school and high school students.

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Mind-Reading AI Turns Thoughts Into Words Using Brain Implant
New Scientist
Jason Arunn Murugesu
March 30, 2020

The University of California, San Francisco's Joseph Makin and colleagues developed an artificial intelligence (AI) that accurately translates thoughts into sentences, for a limited vocabulary of 250 words. The researchers used deep learning algorithms to study the brain signals of four epileptic women as they read sentences, with their brain activity captured through electrodes already implanted in their brains to monitor seizures. The researchers fed the women’s brain activity data to a neural network algorithm, teaching it to identify patterns that could correspond to repeated aspects of speech, like vowels or consonants; those patterns were fed to a second neural network, which attempted to form the words back into a sentence. The AI's best performance across the four subjects was an average 3% translation error rate.

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Empathy Machine: Humans Communicate Better After Robots Show Their Vulnerable Side
Scientific American
Jillian Kramer
March 27, 2020

Researchers from Yale and Cornell universities found that the presence and actions of robots affect how humans relate to other humans. Study participants were formed into four-member teams, each including one humanoid robot, and then were instructed to play a collaborative game on Android tablets. The robots were programmed to act vulnerable in some groups, by apologizing for mistakes, admitting self-doubt, telling jokes, talking about their feelings, and similar actions; robots in control groups were either silent or only made neutral statements. Those working with vulnerability-expressing robots spent more time communicating with their fellow humans than did those in control groups, as well as dividing their conversation time more equally among others in their group, and viewed their experience as more positive.

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Scientists Develop Ankle 'Exoskeleton' That Makes Running 14% Easier Than in Normal Sports Shoes
Daily Mail (U.K.)
Joe Pinkstone
March 25, 2020

Stanford University robotics experts have invented an ankle exoskeleton that makes running easier and less fatiguing. The device attaches to the ankle of joggers, and laboratory tests determined it can reduce energy expenditure 14% compared to standard running shoes alone. The exoskeleton's engineers said the equipment currently only operates on a treadmill and must be connected to a machine through cables, but they hope to make the exoskeleton portable, lightweight, and easy to integrate into future running gear. One version of the device helped runners on a treadmill save an average 24% more energy versus wearing an unpowered device.

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Tell the Boss You Get Bored and it's Time for a VR Game
The CEO Magazine
Ian Horswill
March 5, 2020

Researchers at the University of Sydney (USyd) in Australia developed a virtual reality (VR) game studio to compare the physical exertion experienced by people whose days typically involve long periods of seated work with their exertion levels while playing VR games. The team assessed the participants' physical exertion in the VR game studio, compared to their routine activity captured through step counts on a smartwatch. Said USyd's Soojeong Yoo, “Fully-immersive VR games can make people think they are not doing much exercise, but the latest VR headsets have room-scale technology which enables people to physically move around a virtual space, [enabling them to] experience incidental exercise from interacting with the virtual environment.”

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Android Auto, Apple CarPlay Impair Your Driving More Than Pot or Alcohol
ZDNet
Liam Tung
March 23, 2020

A study by British road-safety charity IAM RoadSmart found that the Android Auto and Apple CarPlay touch controls slow driver reaction times significantly more than driving under the influence of cannabis or alcohol. Touch controls caused greater driver impairment when using infotainment systems, versus cellphones while driving, or texting while driving, Voice controls' effect on reaction times was significantly lower than touch controls on infotainment systems, but higher than the impact of cannabis and alcohol. Using either Android Auto or Apple CarPlay's touch controls took drivers' eyes off the road for longer than U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration recommended guidelines, although using voice control fell within those guidelines.

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Minimuscles Let Amputees Control a Robot Hand with Their Minds
Science
Kelly Servick
March 4, 2020

Researchers at the University of Michigan (UM), Ann Arbor have spent about a decade designing a system that allows amputees to control a robot hand with the power of thought. The concept involves building new minimuscles for nerves by isolating fiber bundles from each major nerve in the arm and wrapping them in a piece of muscle tissue. Plastic surgeon Paul Cederna and UM neural engineer Cynthia Chestek tested prosthetic control on three amputees who had muscle implants, with wires inserted near the grafts to pick up electrical signals and a computer to interpret which tiny muscles were contracting—and to what degree—to isolate different intended movements. Two participants used algorithms that translate electrical signals into movements, controlling both a virtual hand on a computer screen and an actual prosthesis. Chestek said participants could move the prosthesis as desired on the first try, and maintained the same level of control 300 days later.

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How People Investigate—or Don't—Fake News on Twitter, Facebook
UW News
Sarah McQuate
March 18, 2020

University of Washington (UW) researchers explored how people probe potentially suspicious posts on Twitter and Facebook feeds, by observing 25 participants doing so as a Google Chrome extension randomly added debunked material on top of real posts without their knowing. This avoided provoking automatic suspicion by recipients because the fake posts appeared to come from trusted sources. Reactions to fake posts included outright disregard, acceptance at face value, investigation into the suspicious content's veracity, and skepticism that nevertheless did not lead to investigation. UW's Franziska Roesner said these findings point to "opportunities for designers to incorporate people and their understanding of their own networks to design better social media platforms."

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Technology Will Change How Blind People Use Mobile Devices
University of California, Merced
Lorena Anderson
March 9, 2020

Researchers at the University of California, Merced (UC Merced) have developed a new method of enabling blind people to enter text on mobile devices faster and more accurately. Senorita is a virtual, chorded, two-thumb keyboard that comes with eight keys in a single row. Tapping a key enters the letter associated with that key, while tapping two keys together—known as chording—enters the common letter between the keys. The new keyboard allows users to surpass their typing times by 32% after just a short time practicing. The current version of Senorita currently is available only on a limited number of devices, in limited settings.

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