This chapter provides a cross-sectional overview of current neuroimaging techniques and signals used to investigate the processing of linguistically relevant speech units in the bilingual brain. These techniques are reviewed in the light of important contributions to the understanding of perceptual and production processes in different bilingual populations. The chapter is structured as follows. First, we discuss several non-invasive technologies that provide unique insights in the study of bilingual phonetics and phonology. This introductory section is followed by a brief review of the key brain regions and pathways that support the perception and production of speech units. Next, we discuss the neuromodulatory effects of different bilingual experiences on these brain regions from shorter to longer neural latencies and timescales. As we will show, bilingualism can significantly alter the time course, strength, and nature of the neural responses to speech, when compared with monolinguals.

This chapter on Human–Robot Interaction (HRI) focuses on the ways humans respond to and interact with social robots. It begins by delineating recent research into HRI and the factors influencing user interaction with social robots. The main interest of the chapter is on anthropomorphism, that is, the observed human tendency to assign human traits and characteristics to technology, and the implications this has for robot design. After critically analyzing anthropomorphic robot design and its implications for HRI, the chapter discusses the role of ethics in shaping the development of technology in general and social robots in particular. From the European Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI – human agency, transparency, communication, and individual and societal well-being are presented here as concepts and principles of importance for the design of present and future social robots.

Based primarily on the law of the Russian Federation, this chapter reviews the current state of intersectoral relations between different legal schemes that apply to the regulation of robots. To do so, the chapter discusses the complementarity and consistent attempt of legal scholars to integrate legal processes occurring within civil, administrative, and criminal law into a single comprehensive framework for robot regulation. As discussed in this chapter, the connection between the civil law principles of indemnification, liability insurance, and the consideration of criminal law provisions is essential for the establishment of an effective regulatory system for robotic devices, as well as for the construction of norms for the regulation of robots. The chapter argues that there are currently no well-accepted mechanisms in civil law to hold the developers for robots’ software accountable for resulting harm, which is a serious omission given the growing autonomy of robotic devices. Further, the chapter argues that it is essential to recognize controlled and semicontrolled robots as sources of increased danger to individuals and that the responsibility for the damage caused by controlled and semicontrolled robots should be assigned to the robot owners. The chapter concludes that the main criteria distinguishing civil law torts from criminal law offenses when considering harms to individuals resulting from interaction with robots are the degree of public danger and the extent of damage caused by the robotic technology.

In this chapter we consider aspects of phonology for bimodal bilinguals, whose languages span distinct modalities (spoken/signed/written). As for other bilinguals, the primary issues concern the representation of the phonology for each language individually, ways that the phonological representations interact with each other (in grammar and in processing), and the development of the two phonologies, for children developing as simultaneous bilinguals or for learners of a second language in a second modality. Research on these topics has been sparse, and some have hardly been explored at all. Findings so far indicate that despite the modality difference between their two languages, phonological interactions still occur for bimodal bilinguals, providing crucial data for linguistic theories about the locus and mechanisms for such interactions, and important practical implications for language learners.

This chapter examines the acquisition of vowels and consonants in perception and production during typical second language (L2) acquisition by sequential, dominant bilinguals. The acoustic and articulatory studies reviewed serve to illustrate general patterns of L2 segmental learning with a focus on four principal themes, each structured around one or two main research questions: 1) cross-linguistic influence (How does a sequential, dominant bilingual’s first language shape L2 segmental perception and production?); 2) development (Are there universal patterns to L2 segmental speech development? Are certain vocalic and consonantal phenomena acquired more easily?); 3) inter- and intralearner variability (What are the sources of differences in perception and/or production between learners and for the same learner over time and in different communicative contexts?); and 4) training effects (What are the effects of training on learning? How do variables such as task and stimuli type condition effectiveness?).

The aim of this chapter is to provide the state-of-the-art of the research on the development of suprasegmental phonology in bilingual children from infancy through childhood. First, we discuss word-level prosodic phenomena, with a special focus on the bilingual acquisition of word stress and syllable structure, which has been a lively area of research. We also present recent data on the acquisition of tone, which remains a less investigated topic. Second, we consider the acquisition of phrase-level prosody, namely, rhythm and intonation. For each domain of prosodic development, we briefly review monolingual patterns and discuss how learning two (or more) phonological systems can affect developmental trajectories, showing that there can be different cross-linguistic interactions such as transfer, delay, acceleration, or fusion. We also consider potential influencing factors that can trigger different tracks in the development of prosody, for example age of onset, amount of exposure, language dominance, and simultaneous or sequential language acquisition. The chapter concludes with a discussion of avenues for future research.

This chapter briefly reviews various ways in which ethics have been implemented in AI-enabled devices such as humanoid and expressive robots, and how care for other forms of embedded AI is an important part of creating trustable and ethical AI systems. We look at nudging in particular, how robots experienced in social contexts could implement nudging, and the implications of nudging for four fundamental ethical values that underpin trust. We discuss this topic using examples and by presenting important questions that creators of AI-based nudging systems should ask themselves, before and after creating such systems.

Over the last ten years, research on groups of infants and toddlers acquiring more than one language from birth has grown rapidly, though it still trails the research on infants learning just one language. This chapter discusses behavioural and neurophysiological findings about how bilinguals perceive spoken language in the first three years of life. This research demonstrates that bilingual and monolingual infants use similar core mechanisms to learn from differing linguistic input. Crucially, comparing their acquisition trajectories allows us to make inferences about the early linguistic representations of bilingual infants.

This chapter presents the Talker–Listener–Language, or TL2, framework for analyzing variation in speech intelligibility in conversational interactions between interlocutors from different language backgrounds. The TL2 framework is based on three fundamental relations: (a) the relation between the talker and the language being spoken (Talker–LBS), which can vary from low proficiency L2 to L1; (b) the relation between the listener and the language being spoken (Listener–LBS), which also varies from low proficiency L2 to L1; and (c) the relation between the language repertoires of the interlocutors (Talker–Listener), which can either match or mismatch. The central claim of the TL2 framework is that each of the three language relations influences speech intelligibility both independently and through modulation of the others. Evidence from various independent strands of research on speech intelligibility for L1 and L2 talkers and listeners is reviewed to support this claim. The TL2 framework is thus presented as both a coherent perspective on prior research on bilingual speech intelligibility and a map for future research.

This chapter introduces chief postulates common to usage-based (UB) approaches to language. The UB approach maintains that speakers’ experiences with language shape how language is stored. Experiences with specific words and word combinations in particular linguistic, discursive, and social contexts accrue in memory and subsequently contribute to patterns of variability evident in speech productions. Usage-based approaches regularly consider independent effects on lexical representations of decontextualized prior probabilities (e.g. phone/word/bigram frequencies, type frequencies), and, increasingly, contextually informed counts (e.g. lexical items’ cumulative exposure to conditioning effects of the production contexts, phone/word probabilities) are considered. This chapter offers an overview of studies exploring the connection between usage patterns and bilingual sound systems as well as studies exploring evidence of interlingual influence arising from bilingual lexical storage (schematic ties in memory). The chapter suggests potential avenues for future UB research into bilingual phonetics and phonology.

With the emergence of complex systems composed of AI-powered autonomous robots, the argument has emerged that robots that can behave autonomously should be given legal personality and be the subject of legal acts and responsibilities. However, these arguments do not depart from the “humanism” that is the root cause of the problems that current legal theory faces in a complex scientific and technological society. This article attempts to provide a possible solution to the legal problems that arise in today’s complex scientific and technological society by introducing the concept of “legal being” and the novel legal system that enables strategic attribution of legal liability in complex human–robot interactions.

This chapter focuses on the potential impact of anthropomorphic robots on the safety of humans. Regarding the legal protection of human lives, the rise of anthropomorphic robots could pose at least two threats, the “epistemological threat” and the “patient threat.” The epistemological threat concerns humans’ epistemological limitations. Humans could have difficulty in distinguishing humans from robots owing to the way in which humans gather information about the external world. The patient threat concerns the possibility of prioritizing robots in situations in which human life is in danger owing to the recognition of robots as moral patients. This chapter also discusses the place of robots in the hierarchy of legally protected values and ways to mitigate the threat to human superiority by anthropomorphic robots.

The integration of assisted living technologies in the home is rapidly accelerating. As socially assistive robots (SARs) often operate in the private sphere of life, sometimes in symbiotic relations with the people they assist, they may give rise to privacy concerns. This chapter investigates the potential privacy and data protection issues arising from the increasing deployment of assisted living technologies (AAL) in general and SARs in particular. It addresses privacy concerns related to human–robot interactions, including conversational interfaces, audio- and video-based assistive technologies, and analyzes them within the European context. Since the wide range of privacy concerns resulting from using SARs raises particular challenges for the design process, this article zooms in on the Privacy by Design concept introduced in the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Since communication and interaction with robots in therapeutic and care contexts impact data protection, these privacy concerns pose challenges that must be considered in a life cycle starting during the robot design and finalizing the implementation in care settings, including home care.

Heritage language speakers, or heritage speakers in short, are early sequential or simultaneous bilinguals whose home language, generally a diasporic or an indigenous language, differs from the majority language of the society. The goal of this chapter is to provide a comprehensive background of heritage speakers and their sound systems. It includes a literature review on the phonetics and phonology across heritage languages, particularly those of children of immigrants, in various majority language contexts. The chapter first describes heritage speakers and the general characteristics of their language learning experiences and outcomes. It then reviews studies examining heritage speakers’ global accent and factors contributing to perceived heritage accent. It also presents areas of divergence that have been found in the production and perception of heritage language segments and prosody. Lastly, the chapter synthesizes the findings, discussing common patterns observed in heritage language phonetics and phonology, and suggests areas for future research.

Social robots present a novel category of socially interactive technology. There is increasing interest in how people behave toward social robots, how robots can change human behaviors, and what are the factors that influence this interaction. This is a complex relationship between the robot’s physical embodiment, social behaviors, and capabilities, and also the human factor. There are differences in how people behave toward robots and this chapter takes a look at the role of an individual’s cultural background and the factors interwoven with what we generally define as culture, and how those are a factor in holistically understanding how robots are perceived.

Robots are an increasingly common feature in public spaces. From regulations permitting broader drone use in public airspace, and autonomous vehicle testing on public roads, to laws permitting or restricting the presence of delivery robots on sidewalks – law often precipitates the introduction of new robotic systems into shared spaces. Laws that permit, regulate, or prohibit robotic systems in public spaces will in many ways determine how this new technology affects public space and the people who inhabit that space. This begs the questions: How should regulators approach the task of regulating robots in public spaces? And should any special considerations apply to the regulation of robots because of the public nature of the spaces they occupy? With a focus on the Canadian legal system, and drawing upon insights from the interdisciplinary field of law and geography, this chapter argues that the laws that regulate robots deployed in public space will affect the public nature of that space, potentially to the benefit of some human inhabitants of the space over others. For this reason, special considerations should apply to the regulation of robots that will operate in public space. In particular, the entry of a robotic system into a public space should never be prioritized over communal access to and use of that space by people. And, where a robotic system serves to make a space more accessible, lawmakers should avoid permitting differential access to that space through the regulation of that robotic system.

We humans are biased – and our robotic creations are biased, too. Bias is a natural phenomenon that drives our perceptions and behavior, including when it comes to socially expressive robots that have humanlike features. Recognizing that we embed bias, knowingly or not, within the design of such robots is crucial to studying its implications for people in modern societies. In this chapter, I consider the multifaceted question of bias in the context of humanoid, AI-enabled, and expressive social robots: Where does bias arise, what does it look like, and what can (or should) we do about it. I offer observations on human–robot interaction (HRI) along two parallel tracks: (1) robots designed in bias-conscious ways and (2) robots that may help us tackle bias in the human world. I outline a curated selection of cases for each track drawn from the latest HRI research and positioned against social, legal, and ethical factors. I also propose a set of critical next steps to tackle the challenges and opportunities on bias within HRI research and practice.