Aaron Steinfeld, PhD

The cab of a transit bus

Not all offices have desks

Systems Scientist
steinfeld -at- cmu.edu
Office: NSH 4227
Voice: 412-268-6346

Robotics Institute
Carnegie Mellon University
5000 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

My official RI website

Overview

The central themes of my work are what I prefer to term constrained user interfaces and operator assistance. I am interested in how to enable timely and appropriate interaction when interfaces are restricted through design, tasks, the environment, time pressures, and/or user abilities. I utilize training and experience in human factors and ergonomics, robotics, intelligent transportation (ITS), rehabilitation, human-robot interaction (HRI), human-computer interaction (HCI), universal design, wearable computing, and research methods.

Current Projects and Courses

  1. RERC on Accessible Public Transportation: This center is researching and developing methods to empower consumers and service providers in the design and evaluation of accessible transportation equipment, information services, and physical environments. (NIDRR H133E080019)
  2. Quality of Life Technology (QoLT): This NSF ERC is focused on transforming the lives of people with reduced functional capabilities due to aging or disability through appropriate technology developed in a cross-disciplinary manner. Team members include technologists, clinicians, industry partners, end users, and other stakeholders. I am most active in the transportation aspects of the Center and I lead the Safe Driving family of engineered systems activity.
  3. 16-764 Ethnography: Analyzing How Context Affects Technology Use: (Formerly: 16-899Q QoLT Ethnography) This immersive course teaches and demonstrates ethnographic methods for understanding the context in which new technology will be deployed. These include fieldwork, passive and active observation, secondary analyses, and novel computer-assisted approaches. This class will help students characterize and understand the practices, preferences, and needs of end users, the surrounding environment, and the associated societal factors that will affect technology success. The class will emphasize Quality of Life Technologies for people with disabilities and older adults but the methods learned are applicable to any domain where humans and systems interact.
  4. HCC:Medium:Understanding and Modeling Trust in Human-Robot Interactions: This collaboration with the UMass Lowell Robotics Lab seeks to develop quantitative metrics to measure a user's trust in a robot as well as a model to estimate the user's level of trust in real time. Using this information, the robot will be able to adjust its interaction accordingly. (NSF IIS 0905148 & 0905228)
  5. Cyberinfrastructure for Human-Robot Interaction Research: This project seeks to provide the field of HRI with a collaborative cyberinfrastructure to support evaluation documentation, data collection, data sharing, and cross-study comparisons. This portal is located at www.hri-metrics.org. (NSF CBET 0742350)

Sample Projects and Courses

  1. Radar: This goal of this program is to develop a learning "cognitive personal assistant" that supports a variety of organizational tasks and activities. Within the Test group we are deploying a large-scale simulated test environment and are conducting human subject experiments on Radar system performance. Free content and experiment resources can be found at the Airspace website.
  2. Transit Bus Collision Warning Systems: Human factors tasks involved specifying, and subsequently testing, the side warning component of an integrated CWS interface. Partners in this project included California PATH at UC Berkeley - my previous employers.
  3. Auto-Dock: In this project from the Cambria County Transit Authority and PennDOT, we are working with a local small business to facilitate more efficient wheelchair maneuverability within transit vehicles. The end goal is faster loading and unloading of transit riders who use wheelchairs.
  4. 16-899D Assistive Robotic Technology in Nursing and Health Care: This course brought together an interdisciplinary group of students from nursing and other health disciplines, computer science, and robotics to design and evaluate mobile robot systems that help community-residing, frail older adults and persons with disabilities sustain their independence. Note that the 16-899D course number has been reassigned to a new course.
  5. Interoperability of Future Information Systems: This project was focused on investigating human-computer interfaces in support of systems interoperability. It was a joint effort between HCII and the Intelligent Software Agents Lab.
  6. Drowsy Driver Interface: This completed project involved improving the design of a drowsy driver monitoring device that is capable of displaying indications of sleepiness. The system is now available through Attention Technology.

Education

  1. UC Berkeley, California PATH, Post Doc, Transportation Human Factors, 2000.
  2. University of Michigan, Industrial and Operations Engineering, PhD December, 1999.
  3. University of Michigan, Industrial and Operations Engineering, MSE December, 1994.
  4. University of Michigan, Industrial and Operations Engineering, BSE May, 1993.

Publications

  1. Steinfeld, A., Aziz, R., Von Dehsen, L., Park, S. Y., Maisel, J., & Steinfeld, E. (accepted). Modality preference for rider reports on transit accessibility problems. Transportation Research Board 2010 Annual Meeting. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
  2. Faulring, A., Mohnkern, K., Steinfeld, A., & Myers, B. A. (in press). The design and evaluation of user interfaces for the RADAR learning personal assistant. AI Magazine.
  3. Steinfeld, A., Maisel, J. L., & Steinfeld, E. (2009). The value of citizen science to promote transit accessibility. First International Symposium on Quality of Life Technology.
  4. Beyene, N., Cooper, R., & Steinfeld, A. (2009). Driving status and the inner drive for community mobility and participation: A survey of people with disabilities and senior citizens from support groups in New Delhi, India. Proceedings of the Rehabilitation Engineering & Assistive Technology Society of North America (RESNA) Conference. PDF (152 KB) copyrighted
  5. Desai, M. Stubbs, K., Steinfeld, A., & Yanco, H. (2009). Creating trustworthy robots: Lessons and inspirations from automated systems. Proceedings of the AISB Convention: New Frontiers in Human-Robot Interaction.
  6. Steinfeld, A., Jenkins, O. D., & Scassellati, B. (2009). The Oz of Wizard: Simulating the Human for Interaction Research. 4th ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human Robot Interaction. PDF (727 KB) copyrighted
  7. Steinfeld, A. (2008). Smart Systems in Personal Transportation. In A. Helal, M. Mokhtari, & B. Abdulrazak (Eds.), The Engineering Handbook on Smart Technology for Aging, Disability and Independence, John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 0471711551, Computer Engineering Series.
  8. Quinones, P.-A., Vora, J., Steinfeld, A., Smailagic, A., Hansen, J., Siewiorek, D., Phadhana-Anake, P., & Shah, A. (2008). The Effects of Highlighting and Pop-up Interruptions on Task Performance. Annual Meeting of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 2008. PDF (324 KB) copyrighted
  9. Freed, M., Carbonell, J., Gordon, G., Myers, B., Siewiorek, D., Smith, S., Steinfeld, A., & Tomasic, A. (2008). RADAR: A personal assistant that learns to reduce email overload. AAAI Integrated Intelligence. PDF (386 KB) copyrighted
  10. Faulring, A., Mohnkern, K., Steinfeld, A., & Myers, B. (2008). Successful user interfaces for RADAR. In Proc. ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) Workshop on Usable Artificial Intelligence. PDF (149 KB) copyrighted
  11. Mau, S., Melchior, N., Makatchev, M., & Steinfeld, A. (2008). BlindAid: An Electronic Travel Aid for the Blind (Tech Report RI-TR-07-39). Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University, Robotics Institute. PDF (1 MB)
  12. Burghart, C. R. & Steinfeld, A. (2008). Proceedings of Metrics for Human-Robot Interaction, a Workshop at ACM/IEEE HRI 2008 (Technical Report 471). Hatfield, UK: School of Computer Science, University of Hertfordshire. PDF (8610 KB) copyrighted
  13. Steinfeld, A., Bennett, S. R., Cunningham, K., Lahut, M., Quinones, P.-A., Wexler, D., Siewiorek, D., Hayes, J., Cohen, P., Fitzgerald, J., Hansson, O., Pool, M., & Drummond, M. (2007). Evaluation of an Integrated Multi-Task Machine Learning System with Humans in the Loop. In Proc. NIST Performance Metrics for Intelligent Systems Workshop (PerMIS). PDF (1.1 MB) copyrighted.
  14. Steinfeld, A., Quinones, P.-A., Zimmerman, J., Bennett, S. R., & Siewiorek, D. (2007). Survey measures for evaluation of cognitive assistants. In Proc. NIST Performance Metrics for Intelligent Systems Workshop (PerMIS). PDF (457 KB) copyrighted.
  15. Steinfeld, A. (2006). Human-robot interaction. In W. Karwowski (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of Ergonomics and Human Factors, 2nd Edition. London: Taylor & Francis.
  16. Steinfeld, A. (2006). Accessibility and intelligent transportation systems. In U.S. Department of Education, Interagency Committee on Disability Research (ICDR), Wheeled Mobility and Accessible Transportation 2003 Conference Proceedings, Washington, D.C. Word (zip, 284 KB).
  17. Steinfeld, A., Bennett, R., Cunningham, K., Lahut, M., Quinones, P.-A., Wexler, D., Siewiorek, D., Cohen, P., Fitzgerald, J., Hansson, O., Hayes, J., Pool, M. & Drummond, M. (2006). The RADAR Test Methodology: Evaluating a Multi-Task Machine Learning System with Humans in the Loop (Tech Report CMU-CS-06-125, CMU-HCII-06-102). Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University, School of Computer Science. PDF (1.5 MB)
  18. Steinfeld, A., Fong, T., Kaber, D., Lewis, M., Scholtz, J., Schultz, A., & Goodrich, M. (2006). Common metrics for human-robot interaction. 1st Annual Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, Salt Lake City, Utah. PDF (110 KB) copyrighted.
  19. Ferketic, J., Goldblatt, L., Hodgson, E., Murray, S., Wichowski, R., Bradley, A., Fong, T. W., Evans, J., Chun, W., Stiles, R., Goodrich, M. A., Steinfeld, A., King, D., & Erkorkmaz, C. (2006). Toward Human-Robot Interface Standards II: An Examination of Common Elements in Human-Robot Interaction Across the Space Enterprise. Proceedings of American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Space 2006. PDF (824 KB) copyrighted.
  20. Ferketic, J., Goldblatt, L., Hodgson, E., Murray, S., Wichowski, R., Bradley, A., Fong, T. W., Evans, J., Chun, W., Stiles, R., Goodrich, M., & Steinfeld, A. (2006). Toward Human-Robot Interface Standards I: Use of Standardization and Intelligent Subsystems for Advancing Human-Robotic Competency in Space Exploration. SAE 36th International Conference on Environmental Systems, No. 2006-01-2019. PDF (186 KB) copyrighted.
  21. Ayoob, E., Grace, R., & Steinfeld, A. (2005). Subtask B, Phase II: Driver-Vehicle-Interface (DVI) Development of a Drowsy Driver Detection and Warning System for Commercial Vehicles (Tech Report RI-TR-05-46). Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University, Robotics Institute. PDF (7.4 MB).
  22. Mertz, C., Duggins, D., Gowdy, J., Kozar, J., MacLachlan, R., Steinfeld, A., Suppe, A., Thorpe, C., & Wang, C. (2005). Collision Warning and Sensor Data Processing in Urban Areas, In Proc. International Conference on ITS Telecommunications (ITST). PDF (259 KB) copyrighted.
  23. Giampapa, J. A., Sycara, K., Fath, A., Steinfeld, A., & Siewiorek, D. (2004). A Multi-agent system for automatically resolving network interoperability problems. Proceedings of the Third International Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi Agent Systems (AAMAS04). Poster. PDF (69 KB) copyrighted.
  24. Steinfeld, A. (2004). Interface lessons for fully and semi-autonomous mobile robots. IEEE Conference on Robotics and Automation 2004 (ICRA). PDF (339 KB) copyrighted.
  25. Steinfeld, A., Duggins, D., Gowdy, J., Kozar, J., MacLachlan, R., Mertz, C., Suppe, A., Thorpe, C., & Wang, C.-C. (2004). Development of the side component of the transit integrated collision warning system. IEEE Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITSC 2004). PDF (187 KB) copyrighted.
  26. Wang, X., Chang, J., Chan, C.-Y., Johnston, S., Zhou, K., Steinfeld, A., Hanson, M., & Zhang, W.-B. (2004). Development of Requirement Specifications for Transit Frontal Collision Warning System, (UCB-ITS-PRR-2004-14). Richmond, CA: University of California, Partners for Advanced Transit and Highways.
  27. Steinfeld, A., Sanghi, R., Giampapa, J., Siewiorek, D., & Sycara, K. (2003). An Examination of Remote Access Help Desk Cases (Tech Report CMU-CS-03-190, CMU-HCII-03-100). Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University, School of Computer Science. PDF (409 KB).
  28. Ayoob, E., Grace, R., & Steinfeld, A. (2003). A user-centered drowsy driver detection and warning system. In Proceedings of Designing User Experiences 2003 (DUX 2003). PDF (141 KB) copyrighted.
  29. Ayoob, E., Steinfeld, A., & Grace, R. (2003). Identification of an appropriate drowsy driver detection interface for commercial vehicle operations. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 47th Annual Meeting. Santa Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. PDF (1599 KB) copyrighted.
  30. Morris, A., Donamukkala, R., Kapuria, A., Steinfeld, A., Matthews, J., Dunbar-Jacobs, J., & Thrun, S. (2003). A Robotic Walker That Provides Guidance, In Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Robotics and Automation 2003. PDF (525 KB) copyrighted.
  31. Wang, X., Lins, J., Chan, C.-Y., Johnston, S., Zhou, K., Steinfeld, A., Hanson, M., & Zhang, W.-B. (2003). Development of Requirement Specifications for Transit Frontal Collision Warning System, (UCB-ITS-PRR-2003-29). Richmond, CA: University of California, Partners for Advanced Transit and Highways. PDF (2 MB)
  32. Steinfeld, A. (2002). The case for realtime captioning in classrooms, Journal of Court Reporting, 63(5), 76-79. Mirrored online.
  33. Chan, C.-Y., Su, R., & Steinfeld, A. (2002). A mobile platform for roadway incident documentation, In Proceedings of the Ninth Annual World Congress on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), Chicago, October 14-18, 2002 [CD-ROM]. Washington, DC: Intelligent Transportation Society of America.
  34. Steinfeld, A., & Steinfeld, E. (2001). Universal design in automobiles. In W. F. E. Preiser & E. Ostroff (Eds.), Universal Design Handbook. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
  35. Steinfeld, A., Tan, H.-S., & Bougler, B. (2001). Naturalistic findings for assisted snowplow operations. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 45th Annual Meeting. Santa Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.
  36. Krishnan, H., Gibb, S., Steinfeld, A., & Shladover, S. E. (2001). Rear-end collision-warning system: Design and evaluation via simulation, Transportation Research Record - Journal of the Transportation Research Board 1759, 52-60.
  37. Krishnan, H., Gibb, S., Steinfeld, A., & Shladover, S. E. (2001). Rear-end collision warning system: Design and evaluation via simulation, Transportation Research Board 80th Annual Meeting 2001 [CD-ROM]. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
  38. Tan, H.-S., Bougler, B., & Steinfeld, A. (2001). Snowplow steering guidance with gain stabilization, Vehicle System Dynamics, 36(4-5), 279-305.
  39. Steinfeld, A., & Tan, H.-S. (2000). Development of a driver assist interface for snowplows using iterative design, Transportation Human Factors, 2(3), 247-264. PDF (1.5 MB) copyrighted
  40. Misener, J. A., Tsao, H.-S. J., Song, B., & Steinfeld, A. (2000). Emergence of a cognitive car-following driver model: Application to rear-end crashes with a stopped lead vehicle, Transportation Research Record - Journal of the Transportation Research Board 1724.
  41. Misener, J. A., Tsao, H.-S. J., Song, B., & Steinfeld, A. (2000). A focused examination of critical factors and the emergence of a cognitive car following driver model for rear-end crashes with a stopped lead vehicle, Transportation Research Board 79th Annual Meeting 2000 [CD-ROM]. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
  42. Tan, H.-S., Bougler, B., Steinfeld, A., & Kretz, P. (2000). Snowplow Steering Guidance Display - Design and Validation, Proceedings of AVEC 2000, 5th International Symposium on Advanced Vehicle Control (pp. 531-537). Ann Arbor, MI.
  43. Tan, H.-S., & Steinfeld, A. (2000). The importance of gain in driver assisted lateral control, Intelligent Transportation Society of America 10th Annual Meeting 2000, [CD-ROM]. Washington, DC: Intelligent Transportation Society of America.
  44. Yen, K., Tan, H.-S., Steinfeld, A., Thorne, C., Donecker, S., Bougler, B., Kretz, P., Empey, D., Kappesser, R., Ghaida, H. A., Jenkinson, M., Owen, S., Zhang, W.-B., Lasky, T., & Ravani, B. (2000). Development of an Advanced Snowplow Driver Assistance System (ASP-II) (AHMCT Research Report UCD-ARR-00-06-30-02). Davis, CA: University of California, Advanced Highway Maintenance and Construction Technology Center.
  45. Steinfeld, A. (1999). The Benefit to the Deaf of Real-Time Captions in a Mainstream Classroom Environment. Dissertation, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Abstract & purchase or free PDF download (3.4 MB) copyrighted.
  46. Steinfeld, A., & Tan, H.-S. (1999). Preliminary Findings for a Lane-Keeping and Collision-Warning Driver Interface for Snowplow Operations, (PATH Working Paper PWP-99-6). Richmond, CA: University of California, Partners for Advanced Transit and Highways.
  47. Yen, K., Tan, H.-S., Steinfeld, A., Thorne, C., Bougler, B., Cuelho, E., Kretz, P., Empey, D., Kappesser, R., Ghaida, H. A., Jenkinson, M., Owen, S., Zhang, W.-B., Lasky, T., & Ravani, B. (1999). Advanced Snowplow Development and Demonstration: Phase I: Driver Assistance, (AHMCT Research Report UCD-ARR-99-06-30-03). Davis, CA: University of California, Advanced Highway Maintenance and Construction Technology Center.
  48. Zhang, W.-B., Tan, H.-S., Steinfeld, A., Bougler, A., Empey, D., Zhou, K., & Tomizuka, M. (1999). Implementing advanced vehicle control and safety systems (AVCSS) for highway maintenance operations. In Proceedings of the Sixth Annual World Congress on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) [CD-ROM]. Washington, DC: Intelligent Transportation Society of America.
  49. Steinfeld, A. (1998). The benefit of real-time captioning in a mainstream classroom as measured by working memory, Volta Review, 100(1), 29-44. PDF (822 KB) copyrighted
  50. Steinfeld, A., & Green, P. (1998). Driver responses to navigation information on full-windshield, head-up displays, International Journal of Vehicle Design, 19(2), 135-149.
  51. Steinfeld, A., Manes, D., Green, P., & Hunter, D. (1996). Destination Entry and Retrieval with the Ali-Scout Navigation System (Technical Report UMTRI-96-30), Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. (584 KB).
  52. Steinfeld, A., & Green, P. (1995). Driver Response Times to Full-Windshield, Head-Up Displays for Navigation and Vision Enhancement, (Technical Report UMTRI 95-29), Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. PDF (281 KB).

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