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What happens when your walls begin to move? This paper explores the design of human-robot interaction for architectural-scale, shape-changing environments. We present findings from two studies: (1) a series of speculative design workshops (N=20) that uncovered aspirational visions for these spaces, and (2) a task-based Wizard-of-Oz elicitation study (N=12) that grounded these visions in the challenges of practical interaction. Our workshop findings reveal a complex landscape of user desires, exposing critical tensions between proactive automation and the preservation of user autonomy, and between personalization and public ownership. Our elicitation study reveals a set of core interaction challenges related to multimodal collaboration; and, most critically: suggests the need for a modality-agnostic model of evolving user intent. We conclude with a set of grounded proposals for creating robotic environments that are collaborative and trusted partners in everyday life. 

ABSTRACT Motor skill expertise can facilitate more automatic movement, engaging less cortical activity while producing appropriate motor output. Accordingly, cortical-evoked N1 responses to balance perturbation, assessed using electroencephalography (EEG), are smaller in young and older adults with better balance. These responses may thus reflect individual balance challenge versus functional, or objective, task difficulty. However, the effect of balance expertise on cortical responses to balance perturbation has not been studied. We hypothesized that balance ability gained though long-term training facilitates more automatic balance control. Using professional modern dancers as balance experts, we compared cortical-evoked responses and biomechanics of the balance-correcting response between modern dancers and nondancers. We predicted that modern dancers would have smaller cortical-evoked responses and better balance recovery at equivalent levels of balance challenge. Support-surface perturbations were normalized to individual challenge levels by delivering perturbations scaled to 60% and 140% of each individual’s step threshold. In contrast to our prediction, dancers exhibited larger N1 responses compared to nondancers while demonstrating similar biomechanical responses. Our results suggest dancers have greater cortical sensitivity to balance perturbations than nondancers. Further, dancer N1 responses modulated across perturbation magnitudes according to differences in objective task difficulty. In contrast, nondancer N1 responses modulated as a function of individual challenge level. Our findings suggest dance training increases sensitivity of the initial, cortical N1 response to balance perturbation, supporting postural alignment to an objective reference. The N1 response may reflect differences in balance-error processing that are altered with specific long-term training and may have implications for rehabilitation. NEW & NOTEWORTHYModern dancers show larger cortical responses to balance perturbations than nondancers, suggesting a greater sensitivity to perturbations. These results contrast with evidence of larger cortical-evoked responses in young adults with poorer balance, consistent with the cortical N1 response being a balance error assessment signal. Whereas nondancers scaled cortical responses by individual differences in N1 amplitude, dancers’ cortical responses were scaled to objective differences in perturbation magnitude, suggesting increased postural awareness due to training. 

Students in introductory chemistry pursue various programs of study (such as biomedical engineering) and may not see chemistry as central to their pursuits. The Informative Utility Value Intervention (IUVI) was developed to provide students with reading materials that explicitly link chemistry topics to their future career interests. By offering career-contextualized content, IUVI aims to help students recognize the practical applications of chemistry for their career interests. The current study qualitatively compares students' written reflections before and after engaging with the reading materials for perceptions of the utility of chemistry. Findings indicate that engagement with the IUVI reading materials reinforced, refined, or expanded students' perceptions of chemistry's utility, depending on how well the provided materials resonated with their career interests. Students’ prior conceptions and content alignment of the reading materials played a central role in shaping students’ perceptions of utility value of chemistry. These findings emphasize the importance of offering students greater autonomy to support the development of utility value of chemistry. 

The topic of intermolecular forces presents a persistent challenge for general chemistry students. This study explores the use of electrostatic potential maps (EPMs) as a representational tool to support conceptual change in students’ understanding of intermolecular forces by visually depicting molecular geometry and electrostatic features. Thirteen participants were recruited for semistructured interviews where they were presented with parallel intermolecular force tasks. First students identified intermolecular forces when given Lewis Dot structures with electronegativity values provided and then when given EPMs without electronegativity values provided. Interview transcripts were analyzed from the perspective of cognitive dissonance in comparing each student's approaches between the two representations, and findings indicate that the EPMs produced productive changes, challenging participants’ conceptions tied to the features of the Lewis Dot structure and electronegativity values. Instances of unproductive changes were also present, as the features of the EPM generated further problematic complexities in students’ conceptions and caused participants to question the productive conceptions they carried. Consequently, this study highlights EPMs’ potential as a pedagogical tool to challenge students’ conceptions of intermolecular forces and discloses the complexities instructors must address when introducing EPMs into the curriculum. Future studies should investigate how the continual integration of EPMs into the chemistry curriculum influences students’ proficiency at applying core concepts across different contexts and supports measurable improvements in performance on both formative and summative assessments.