“As a child, I dreamed of a robot that would explain other people’s emotions to me,” says Sharifa Alghowinem, a researcher in the Personal Robots Group (PRG) at the Media Lab. Growing up in Saudi Arabia, Alghowinem says she dreamed of one day coming to MIT to develop Arabic-based technologies and create a robot that could aid her and others navigate a convoluted world.
Early in her life, Alghowinem had difficulty understanding social cues and never scored well on standardized tests, but her dreams carried her through. Before leaving home to continue her education in Australia, she obtained a bachelor’s degree in computer science. It was at the Australian National University that she first discovered affective computing and began working on helping artificial intelligence detect human emotions and moods, but it was at MIT that she came to MIT as a postdoctoral fellow as part of the Ibn Khaldun Fellowship for Women from Saudi Arabia, housed in the Faculty of Engineering MIT Mechanical Engineering that she was finally able to work on technology that had the potential to explain others’ emotions in English and Arabic. Today, she says she enjoys her work so much that she calls the lab “my playground.”
Alghowinem cannot deny an invigorating project. She found one with enormous potential to make robots more helpful to humans by working with Jibo, a genial robot companion developed by the company’s founder Personal Robots Group (PRG) and social robot startup Jibo Inc., MIT professor and dean of digital learning Cynthia Breazeal. Breazeal’s research explores the potential of companion robots that extends far beyond assistants performing transactional commands such as querying the daily weather, adding items to shopping lists, or controlling lighting. At the MIT Media Lab, the PRG team is designing Jibo to be an insightful trainer and companion in advancing social robotics technology and research. Visitors to the MIT Museum can experience Jibo’s adorable personality.
Alghowine’s research focused on mental health care and education, often collaborating in groups with other undergraduate students and students in the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. In one study, Jibo trained youthful and older adults using positive psychology. He tailored his interventions based on the verbal and nonverbal responses he observed in participants. For example, Jibo records the verbal content of a participant’s speech and combines it with nonverbal information, such as long pauses and hugs. If it comes to the conclusion that deep emotions have been revealed, Jibo responds with empathy. If the participant does not reveal information, Jibo asks a gentle follow-up question, such as: “Can you tell me more?”
Another project investigated how a robot could effectively support high-quality interactions between parents and children while reading a storybook together. Many PRG studies work together to find out what kind of data a robot needs to understand people’s social and emotional states.
“I would like Jibo to become a companion for the whole house,” says Alghowinem. Jibo can play different roles for different family members, such as a companion to remind elders to take their medications, or a playmate for children. Alghowine is particularly motivated by the unique role Jibo can play in maintaining emotional well-being and playing a preventive role in cases of depression and even suicide. Incorporating Jibo into your daily life gives Jibo the ability to spot emerging issues and intervene, acting as a confidential resource or mental health coach.
Alghowin is also passionate about teaching and mentoring others, and not just through robots. She meets individually weekly with the students she mentors, and earlier this year she was instrumental in bringing two undergraduate students from Prince Sultan University in Saudi Arabia. With their social-emotional experiences in mind, she worked challenging to create opportunities for the two students to visit MIT together so they could support each other. One visiting student, Tasneem Burghleh, says she was curious to meet someone who went out of her way to create opportunities for strangers and discovered in her “an endless passion that makes me want to pass it on and share it with others.” “
Alghowinem then works to create opportunities for Syrian refugee children. The plan, still in the fundraising stage, is to equip social robots to teach children English and social-emotional skills, as well as provide activities to preserve cultural heritage and Arabic language skills.
“We prepared the groundwork by making sure Jibo spoke Arabic and a few other languages,” Alghowinem says. “Now I hope we can learn how to make Jibo really useful for kids like me who need support as they learn to interact with the world around them.”