Live Life to Your Fullest: Assistive Robot with Theory of Mind to Support Older Adults Aging in Place

This work proposes a design concept for integrating a Theory of Mind (ToM) architecture in a robot to support older adults in aging in place. The robot will continuously assess human capabilities, adapt its assistance to preserve their intrinsic capacity (IC) and functional ability (FA), and directly support Activities of Daily Living (ADLs). While assistive robots exist, assistance is typically limited to either purely social or companionship-oriented interactions, or, in the case of physical assistance, is modeled as a binary decision providing either full assistance or none. Such formulations fail to account for the user’s continuously varying IC, FA, preferences, and desire for autonomy. The goal of this project is to (i) integrate assessments of cognitive and physical capabilities into a dynamic, real-time human model, (ii) evaluate ToM-based adaptation, and (iii) validate the system through laboratory testing and long-term user studies. The work addresses research gaps in cognitive monitoring, adaptive assistance, and direct ADL support by socially assistive robots.