Conference participants and speakers came from the United States, England, Spain, and Italy, in addition to Israel.
One of the inventions presented was a robot dog that responds just like an actual dog in interaction with people, and is always friendly and playful. The robot's programmer, computer science Professor Dr. Ehud Sharlyn, said that his "dog" could be especially useful in social rehabilitation. His goal has been to elicit human emotions and responses from an alternatively playful and timid dog.
"People in need of rehabilitation," Dr. Sharlyn explained, "may perceive these synthetic emotions as though they elicited them." He cited autistic children and elderly lonely people as two categories of individuals who could possibly benefit from the interaction.
Another display, by a master's degree candidate at Haifa University, used Virtual Reality technology to treat victims of terrorist bombings who suffer from severe post-traumatic stress disorder. The treatment recreates the terror attack through virtual reality, a step felt to be necessary for recovery. Dr. Naomi Josman, the graduate student's thesis adviser at Haifa University's Department of Occupational Therapy, says the treatment sessions are accompanied by a clinical psychologist as well.
The showcase was part of a three-day conference this week on Virtual Reality, Associated Technologies and Rehabilitation. It was jointly sponsored by the University of Haifa's Caesarea Rothschild Computer Science Institute and the institution's Laboratory for Innovations in Rehabilitation Technology.
One of the inventions presented was a robot dog that responds just like an actual dog in interaction with people, and is always friendly and playful. The robot's programmer, computer science Professor Dr. Ehud Sharlyn, said that his "dog" could be especially useful in social rehabilitation. His goal has been to elicit human emotions and responses from an alternatively playful and timid dog.
"People in need of rehabilitation," Dr. Sharlyn explained, "may perceive these synthetic emotions as though they elicited them." He cited autistic children and elderly lonely people as two categories of individuals who could possibly benefit from the interaction.
Another display, by a master's degree candidate at Haifa University, used Virtual Reality technology to treat victims of terrorist bombings who suffer from severe post-traumatic stress disorder. The treatment recreates the terror attack through virtual reality, a step felt to be necessary for recovery. Dr. Naomi Josman, the graduate student's thesis adviser at Haifa University's Department of Occupational Therapy, says the treatment sessions are accompanied by a clinical psychologist as well.
The showcase was part of a three-day conference this week on Virtual Reality, Associated Technologies and Rehabilitation. It was jointly sponsored by the University of Haifa's Caesarea Rothschild Computer Science Institute and the institution's Laboratory for Innovations in Rehabilitation Technology.