This research aims at understanding from the viewpoint of the ecological phenomenology all human activity as circulative interactions between body-subject and the environment and trying to establish philosophical and theoretical ground for a comprehensive human environmental science. We have focused on the issue of how to construct a middle-scale human environment that is suitable for human wellbeing and environmental sustainability. During our 5 years research, we have achieved many splendid results, for examples a series of anthology, papers, presentations, symposiums, workshops, and invited lectures, as shown in “study results” and largely contributed to the formation of a new field of positivistic phenomenology of the environment.

The purpose of our research was, in the light of an ecological approach, to investigate musicians’ bodily skills and their coordinative body structure that acts as a foundation of “dexterity” in musical performance. First, in order to record the features of body movement, we designed an experiment with a professional violinist and asked her to play musical fragments before and after receiving ecological-physical therapy. We found differences in the sensor data and also in the therapist’s diagnosis after the treatment. This implied that, through the therapy, the violinist’s muscle tension was reduced and some coordinative structures between body segments emerged and/or were re-activated, which increased flexibility and allowed the violinist to improve her performance. Additionally, we attempted to describe the continuity between experts’ bodily skills and young infants’ musical activities with reference to studies on the development of children’s physical and musical abilities.

We investigated behaviors based on haptic perception in humans, pill bugs and starfish. In starfish, tube feet movements appeared to affect flexible and efficient righting. In pill bugs, diversity was observed in behaviors where antennae play important roles such as turn alternation behavior. In humans, the subjects created various movements to percept roughness of objects.

Our life is always supported by various artificial environments. First, we have explicated the structure of this “Being-in-the artificial environment” from a viewpoint of the ecological phenomenology, philosophy of technology, ecological psychology, cognitive science, and architecture. Second, we have explicated the practical possibility and meaning of this approach, considering the problems of universal design and human centereddesign.

In applying the approach of ecological psychology to the domain of communication and social interaction, We have conducted experimental and philosophical researches on how communication by human bodies which are filled with affordances for interaction is transformed into conventional and normative social interactions. As shown in the below accomplishment list, we have achieved more results(papers, books, presentations, lecture series, and symposium) than expected in the original plan, and contributed to the development of this new domain.

The effect of the act of wiggling one's body on posture control was studied. The change of strategy for posture control after the therapeutic wiggling movement (wiggling one's body by a physical therapist, or by oneself) was compared with the strategy after an ordinal strength training for outer muscles in terms of the sway in quiet standing. The results showed that the wiggling movement seemed to facilitate one's perception to his/her body by dynamic touch, and change the posture control strategy from static to dynamic.

Psycholinguistic research on speech and spontaneous gesture has revealed that spontaneous gesture makes important contributions to the production and comprehension of instructions and narratives (e.g., story retelling). However, speech-gesture coordination is not necesarily stable all the time, but it can sometimes be disfluent. Possible factors contributing to the disfluency include speech tempo, complexity of the content of speech, honorifix, complexity due to the adjustment made for the addressee's comprehension level about the contents, etc. There does not seem to be systematic study about how spontaneous gesture and speech become disfluent and how they are organized to become fluent again. The present study focuses on what is called "microslips" in research on intrumental actions, and attempts to determine whether microslips can be observed with gesture, and, if so, what the conditions are to induce microslips in gesture. For this purpose, we collected cartoon narrative data of speakers relating the story of "Canary Row," where factors such as listener location was manipulated. The results suggest the effect of listener location and complexity of the speech content on average frequency of microslips on spontaneous gesture. These outcomes are to be described in papers in preparation for submitting as journal papers as well as presentations to be made in academic conferences.

Media literacy has got it position in education in Japan. Among the reading and writing, there are many practices to watch and to recognize TV programs. However, there are few actions to the picture production.
We have to show the models of the picture to activate picture production in Japanese school. Because, school teacher try to make work as broadcast level then practice do not continue. It is not understood that there is the development of picture production in the same way as the painting of the child, so child may make original work. In Japan, there is the culture that citizens enjoy the development of the child. We exhibit pictures and the handwritings of the child even though it's not so good works. We should make same culture.
In this study, we cleared as follows:
1. We made the system which children and students produce picture works in cooperation with elementary, junior high and high school teachers. We broadcast the works in Fukui pref. in cooperation with NHK Fukui Broadcasting, Station. 135 schools broadcasted their productions. It is a one-third of the total number of schools in Fukui pref. We showed that school had power to make a picture.
2. We made the system to broadcast picture works made by university students in cooperation with NHK Mito Broadcasting Station. In the case of university, there are three purposes in picture production. 1st. We perform it media literacy education. We teach students how to make picture works and they are requested to make picture works as research report. 2nd. We promote it as the student's operant activity, assertion or expression of themselves. 3rd. We promote it as the introduction of our study and education activity. We broadcasted 32 programs in 3 years. We introduced research institute and student's circles in live for 18 times. We have broadcasted Total 50 times.
Conclusion: We showed that we have a power to make picture works from elementary school to University. And also, we showed we can make so many products. We made a model of cooperation between School and Broadcasting Station which would be possible in the other areas and promote picture works.

道具使用場面における課題の難易度と全身の協応状態との関係を明らかにするために、実験参加者の課題遂行時における「測定圧力中心分布」を、重心動揺計(ひずみゲージ式変換器:LUB-5OKB-P 4台、計装用コンディショナ:WGA-67OB-O 4台から構成)によって測定した。実験参加者の課題は「ハサミ(全長165mm,刃渡り75mm)の開閉運動」とし、ハサミの開閉運動(ヒンジ部における角度変化)を村田製作所製トリマポテンショメータ(PVS1A)によって計測した。大学生(すべて右利き)を被験者とし、楽な呼吸を行いながらもっとも好ましい速度で、しかし実際には紙を切らずに空中でハサミを開閉する条件(A条件)、および、楽な呼吸を行いながらもっとも好ましい速度で、A4版上質コピー用紙の長辺の縁を「およそ1cmの深さで、できるだけ細かく、ほぼ一定の間隔で短冊状に切り込むこと」を繰り返す条件(B条件)とに分けて実験を行った。重心動揺計から得られた波形データ(30秒間分)について、再帰性定量化分析(Recurrence Quantification Analysis)における3つの指標(%REC,%DET,MAXLINE)によって評価した。その結果、特に「%DET値」において、A条件<B条件となることがあきらかとなった。この結果は、ハサミを単に空中で開閉しているときとよりも、ハサミを使って紙を切るという注意を要する課題を遂行しているときに、全身の協調状態に関して、より決定論性の強い状態が構築されていることを示している.呼吸運動は重心の変動に影響を与える要因の一つであるが、呼吸運動を含む全身の協調状態は、道具使用場面において、課題に即して目的的に変化することが示唆された.

本研究は、発話と身振りというマルチモーダルな身体運動の個人内及び個人間で成立する協調を生態心理学と心理言語学の観点から明らかにし、特に発話・身振り双方の下位系である呼吸運動との協調に着目して、発話と身振りの協調を生態力学的・心理言語学的に制約する情報を特定することを目的として行われた。今年度は以下の2つの研究を行った。
(1)昨年度までに、母音の発声と手首の伸展・屈曲運動を同期させる協調実験を、個人内協調と個人間協調に関してそれぞれ実施した。その結果、発声と手首運動とのあいだの協調ダイナミクスの質的な転換と、呼吸運動のパターンの質的な転換とが密接に関わっていることを示した。これを踏まえて、今年度は、手首運動と呼吸運動の協調に関して、再帰定量分析(RQA)という手法を用いて直接評価した。その結果、個人内、個人間協調とも、協調モードの違いによって、カップリングの強さに違いがあることなどが明らかになりつつある。
(2)「まく(巻く)」を連続して何度も発声すると、ある時点で「くま(熊)」に意味が反転したように感じられる、いわゆる意味反転という現象がある。この反転現象が課題開始から生起するまでにかかる時間は、意味的に関連する身振り(例では巻く動作)を共起させることで、遅延されることが知られている。本実験では、これが身振りのイメージによるものか、またはダイナミカルな情報によるものかを吟味することを目的として実験を実施したが、先行研究の結果とは異なり、身振り動作の種類が意味反転のタイミングには影響せず、動作の周波数のみが影響するという結果が得られた。この結果が示唆するところについては現在考察を進めているところである。
この他、自然会話そのものに関する研究についても一定の成果が得られた。これらの成果の一部はすでに公表済みであるが、現在、公表していないものにっいて論文執筆作業を進めているところである。

自己の身体の方向を知覚する際の、身体部位の慣性主軸の効果について確認するための実験を行った。被験者は椅子に腰掛け、前腕に十字型の機材(前後約63cm、左右約60cm、質量約675g。アルミと樹脂製)を固定された。機材の左右に突き出た腕には、「右に200g」「左に200g」「左右に100gずつ」のいずれかの条件で重りが取り付けられた。被験者は上腕を体側に密着させ、前腕を床と平行に保つように教示された。被験者の前腕部は、高さ80cmの位置に床と平行に設置されたパネル(幅120cm、奥行48cm)で上部から覆い隠された。パネル上部の被験者に相対する位置に、横一列(10cm間隔)に並んだ目標が取り付けられ、被験者は各試行においてそのうちの1つを、前腕の水平方向の向きを調整することによって指示するように求められた。以上の実験から、被験者の前腕による方向指示は、(1)重りの位置の条件によって体系的な誤差が生じる、(2)その誤差は、十字型の機材を含めた前腕部の慣性主軸の方向と一致していることが確認された。これにより、身体方向の知覚が当該部位の慣性主軸の知覚に基づいていることが確認された。しかし、一方で(3)指示すべき目標の位置による効果があることも確認された。その原因の一つとして、肘関節の内旋/外旋にともなう筋群のバランスの変化が考えられる。そこであらかじめ被験者の前腕部に一定の負荷を加えることにより、内旋/外旋のための筋群の一部を疲労させ、そのバランスを崩した上で同様の実験を行った。その結果、とりわけ前腕部の回外運動に関わる筋群を疲労させた際に、慣性主軸の方向に関する感受性が低下することが確認された。以上の結果から、自己の身体の方向に関する触覚的な印象を支える慣性主軸の知覚が、筋群のダイナミックなバランスによって支えられていることが示唆された。

This paper discusses the emotion of human-friendly robot from the viewpoint of perceiving-acting cycle. We aim that a robot behaves as if it had heart and emotion by taking behaviors based on the perceiving-acting cycle. In this paper, we focus on the internal model of the robot, and discuss the relation between perceiving and action. We apply a modular neural network to realize the behaviors based on the concept of the perceiving-acting cycle. This paper shows