This project explores how Augmented Reality (AR) can support children with dy-scalculia, a learning disorder affecting their ability to understand numbers and perform basic arithmetic. Dyscalculia impacts around 3–6% of school-aged children, making everyday tasks like reading a clock or using money difficult. The project brings together AR researchers from Aarhus University and Forlaget Pind og Bjerre, a Danish educational publisher specializing in mathematics teaching materials for teachers, students, parents, and trainee teachers. The company pro-duces textbooks, hands-on learning resources, and the RoS series (structured ma-terials to support children with math difficulties). Our goal is to combine techno-logical and pedagogical expertise to develop early interactive AR prototypes based on existing materials for children with dyscalculia created by Pind og Bjerre, through a process of co-design involving both researchers and experts. These pro-totypes are initially intended to support at-home training for children with dyscal-culia, offering alternative ways to engage with mathematical concepts for children who need alternative approaches to learning. At its core, this collaboration is about mutual knowledge exchange and starting a relationship that bridges re-search, design, and real-world practices. Research shows that children with dy-scalculia benefit from multisensory, embodied, and individualized learning envi-ronments. AR supports this by overlaying interactive digital content onto the physical world, creating immersive and hands-on experiences. AR enables chil-dren to manipulate virtual objects with natural gestures, engage in spatial reason-ing, and receive real-time feedback. Yet despite its potential, AR remains un-derused in this area. Existing AR apps are often generic or focused on short-term aids like calculators, without targeting deep mathematical understanding or offer-ing long-term training potential. This project addresses that gap by co-designing AR tools grounded in real pedagogical needs.Description

• We investigate the experiences with implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare. Implementation of AI in healthcare has proven to be complicated and fraught with difficulties. Hence, the many expectations to and investments in AI over the last decade is contrasted by the few examples of successful implementation of healthcare AI in Denmark as well as internationally. We have seen successful cases in Denmark and internationally, but even more project that that have stalled or been terminated. There is a need for collecting experiences and gaining an overview of implementations of AI in order to identify furthering and hindering factors in implementation processes. As one of the most digitized countries in the world, Denmark is an apt place to do this.
• The project will apply qualitative methods and selected cases to develop an empirically based overview that will provide the basis for richly facetted and empirically based case examples of implementation experiences, as well as overall guidance and frameworks for implementing AI in healthcare. Cases will be selected with an aim of variety considering cases of AI for decision-support, diagnosis, or prediction on the one hand and cases of AI being implemented, in-use or being scaled.Description

The physical design of social robots plays a significant role in how they are perceived, as well as which social and emotional abilities are attributed to them. Robots today are often designed with a childlike and cute appearance, as existing research has shown that this can evoke strong emotional reactions in users and help to make the robots appear more friendly and trustworthy.

The challenge with this design choice is that such robots, through their physical form, are often attributed unintended and undesirable human social and emotional traits. Additionally, the childlike appearance can be perceived as patronising, which may lead to the robot not being accepted in the home.

When designing social robots for the future, it is important that their design provides an appropriate level of information about the robot's possibility for social coordination, without the user necessarily attributing human characteristics to the design.

The goal of the ACUTE project is to explore precisely this balancing act between sociality and the robot’s form. The project will investigate a new visual category of social robots for the home, inspired by the objects we surround ourselves with daily, rather than imitating living beings or machines, thereby generating new knowledge about how we as humans understand and decode social traits in robots.
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The Interdisciplinary Centre for Extended Reality (ICXR) is an ongoing research initiative at Aarhus University. The center brings together researchers from across faculties and disciplines who investigate or apply Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), and related technologies. ICXR provides a collaborative platform for sharing research, fostering interdisciplinary dialogue, and exploring the future potential and societal impact of immersive and spatial technologies.Description

The DARE project operates within the interdisciplinary field of Humanities research in Human-Robot Interaction (HRI), combining philosophical expertise (social ontology, phenomenology, axiology, ethics), anthropological fieldwork, and constructive design research. With a focus on assistive robotics for supporting independent living among older adults, the project investigates the complex interplay between value hierarchies (e.g., autonomy vs. dignity), self-conceptions in aging, and robot appearance.
The world is facing a major demographic challenge in the coming decades, as the number of elderly citizens increases while the workforce declines. Welfare robots are predicted to play a significant role in addressing this challenge by assisting older adults with daily tasks, thereby extending their ability to live independently at home. However, despite promises of increased autonomy and dignity, many older adults hesitate to welcome robots into their homes. Research points to robot appearance as a central reason for this resistance—many robots have toy-like, futuristic, or mechanical designs that clash with older adults’ values and perceptions of home.
To address this issue, the DARE project explores how robot design can better align with users’ values and environments. Drawing on insights from recent design studies of shape-changing objects, the project introduces a new design category: “enabling social interiors.” This concept moves away from imitating living beings or machines and instead draws inspiration from everyday objects and furniture, aiming to create robots that integrate seamlessly into domestic spaces.
The project seeks to understand and improve the acceptance of welfare robots by examining the relationship between values, self-understanding, form, and interior design. Through an interdisciplinary theoretical and methodological approach—including philosophical and phenomenological value analysis, anthropological methods, and constructive design research—the project explores a new innovative design space at the intersection of objects, furniture, interiors, values, and individuals.
Ultimately, the DARE project contributes knowledge not only to the specific domain of elder care robotics but also to the broader development of social robots. It offers new approaches to adjusting robots’ social signals and physical form to better suit specific contexts, enhancing their acceptance and effectiveness in real-world environments.
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