Research Vision
Research Vision - Cognitive-Affective Symbiosis
DOC_REF: PROPOSAL_2026-2030
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RESEARCH VISION
Towards
Cognitive-Affective Symbiosis
Moving beyond surface-level signal processing to build embodied, psychologically grounded intelligence.
"How can we build psychologically grounded, fine-grained, multimodal, efficient, and full-duplex conversational AI systems that better understand and respond to human emotions?"
Paradigm Shift Analysis MOUSE_OVER_TO_SCAN
Identifying critical bottlenecks in current SOTA systems: from passive semantic processing to active social agency.
Social Agency
CURRENT: PASSIVE RETRIEVER
Powerful semantic engines, but fundamentally "solipsistic." Limited Theory of Mind (ToM) capabilities [Kosinski, 2023] lead to superficial empathy.
TARGET: ACTIVE RESONANCE
Systems with intrinsic motivation to align with human mental states. Moving from "Understanding" to "Resonating" via psychological grounding.
Multimodal Synchrony
CURRENT: ASYNCHRONOUS
Despite advances like GPT-4o [OpenAI, 2024], fine-grained behavioral cues (micro-expressions) are often lost in "text-dominant" latent spaces.
TARGET: HIGH-FIDELITY
Efficient adapters that preserve low-level acoustic/visual features, enabling real-time affective synchronization.
Temporal Dynamics
CURRENT: AMNESIC & RIGID
Suffers from "Temporal Amnesia" regarding affective history [Park et al., 2023]. Constrained by turn-taking (wait-to-speak) latency.
TARGET: CONTINUOUS FLOW
Full-duplex (interruptible) interaction backed by evolving, long-term affective memory.
Research Horizons STRATEGIC_TRAJECTORY
HORIZON I
Foundation & Efficiency
- Developing Data Infrastructure for high-fidelity, fine-grained multimodal emotion analysis.
- Designing cost-effective Multimodal Adapters to align LLMs with non-verbal signals.
- Enabling efficient test-time adaptation for personalized user alignment.
- ...
HORIZON II
Cognitive Kernel
- Building Long-Term Affective Memory with dynamic update and retrieval mechanisms.
- Integrating Theory of Mind (ToM) to infer implicit mental states and intent [Picard, MIT].
- Creating the "Psychological Mirror": Systems that reflect and validate user emotions.
- ...
HORIZON III
Embodiment & Complexity
- Realizing Full-Duplex Interaction: Handling interruptions, backchanneling, and multi-party dynamics.
- Bridging generative AI with Robotics for parametric expression control [Hu et al., 2024].
- Achieving seamless cognitive-affective symbiosis in complex, real-world scenarios.
- ...