Call for participation: Seventh Joint IEEE International Conference on Developmental Learning and Epigenetic Robotics (ICDL-EpiRob 2017), Lisbon, Portugal (Sep 18-21)

http://www.icdl-epirob.org/

The past decade has seen the emergence of a new scientific field in which computational techniques are employed to study how intelligent biological and artificial systems develop sensorimotor, cognitive and social abilities through dynamic interactions with their physical and social environments, with a twofold objective: to gain a better understanding of human and animal intelligence, and to enable artificial systems with more adaptive and flexible behaviors.
The two most prominent conference series of this area, the International Conference on Development and Learning (ICDL) and the International Conference on Epigenetic Robotics (EpiRob), are joining forces for the seventh time and invite submissions for a joint meeting in 2017 to explore, extend, and consolidate the interdisciplinary boundaries of this exciting research field. In addition to the usual paper submission-selection process, the BabyBot Challenge will crown computational models that capture core aspects of specific psychology experiments.

Topics of interest include (but are not limited to):

– general principles of development and learning;

– development of skills in biological systems and robots;

– nature VS nurture, critical periods and developmental stages;

– architectures for cognitive development and life-long learning;

– emergence of body knowledge and affordance perception;

– models for prediction, planning and problem solving;

– models of human-human and human-robot interaction;

– emergence of verbal and non-verbal communication skills;

– epistemological foundations and philosophical issues;

– models of child development from experimental psychology.