@inproceedings {pub6418,
	title = {Robots for Communities},
	author = {Hifza Javed AND Ella Maule AND Thomas H Weisswange AND Bilge Mutlu},
	year = {2026},
	month = {March},
	abstract = {This workshop on Robots for Communities explores how robots
can serve as shared social resources that support the collective
well-being of communities. While robots have traditionally been
created to serve corporations or individuals, leading human{\textendash}robot
interaction research to focus largely on individuals or small groups,
communities remain a crucial yet underexplored context for robotics. Understanding robots in community settings requires an inter-disciplinary lens that integrates robotics, design, the social sciences, humanities, and community practice. Rather than emphasizing the negative consequences of large-scale deployment, our focus is on the active, positive roles robots might play in shaping communities. Central to this vision is viewing robots not as personal possessions but as shared resources, with unique affordances that enable them to enrich community experiences in ways other technologies cannot. The workshop seeks to bridge technology-centered and community-centered perspectives to promote dialogue across disciplines. By bringing these perspectives together, we aim to establish an interdisciplinary agenda for the design, evaluation, and deployment of robots as positive forces for well-being and cohesion
within communities.},
	publisher = {ACM},
	booktitle = { 21st ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI 2026)},
	city = {Edinburgh, UK}
}