HAI

It is our great pleasure to welcome you to The Fourth International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction (HAI 2016) and the vibrant city of Singapore. HAI has grown beyond our expectations in last three years and this year's HAI continues its tradition of being the relevant forum for presentation of research results and experience reports on leading edge issues of Human-Agent Interaction. HAI gathers researchers from fields spanning engineering, computer science, psychology, sociology and cognitive science while covering diverse topics including Human-Virtual/Physical agent interaction, communication and interaction with smart home/smart cars, and modeling of those interactions.

The mission of the conference is to share novel quantitative and qualitative research on human and artificial agent interaction and identify new directions for future research and development. HAI gives researchers and practitioners a unique opportunity to share their perspectives with others interested in the various aspects of human-agent interaction.

The theme for HAI 2016 is "Machine learning methods and multimodal interfaces to achieve social intelligence in robots, avatars, and virtual characters". The programme for HAI 2016 includes two exciting keynote talks by the world leaders in areas related to human-agent interaction: Prof. David Hsu of the National University of Singapore and Prof. Leila Takayama of University of California, Santa Cruz and Researcher, Hoku Labs. We encourage participants to attend them.

This year, we saw a record number of submissions in full paper, late-breaking poster as well as workshop proposal categories. The programme committee has unanimously remarked on the exceptional quality of this year's submissions and had a tough time playing the role of the gatekeeper with the acceptance rate of 43.9%. Our final programme features 29 oral presentations, 46 poster presentations, 2 tutorials and 3 workshops. All of them present latest research results and ideas of interest to HAI researchers. It will also be a good avenue for researchers from all over the world to discuss and network, hopefully generating new ideas and seeding new collaborations.

In addition to the stimulating conference programme, Singapore, with its tourist attractions, cultural diversity and top-notch quality cuisine, is one of the all-time favourite place to visit. With a recent conferment of 29 Michelin Star restaurants which include affordable hawker stalls, we hope that you will get a chance to explore Singapore and enjoy the sumptuous culinary experience in the vibrant city state.