Masakazu Hirokawa
Papers
23
Total Citations
233
H-Index
10
About
Masakazu Hirokawa is a leading researcher in socially assistive robotics, with a focus on developing robotic systems that support children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and promote healthy aging. His work centers on human-robot interaction, affective computing, and haptic feedback, aiming to create robots that can sense, adapt to, and encourage prosocial behaviors. Hirokawa’s major contributions include demonstrating that haptic assistance can effectively teach complex driving skills (26 citations), and showing that smile analysis in robot-assisted therapy can facilitate prosocial behaviors in children with ASD (18 citations). He has also pioneered the use of humanoid robots for training facial expression recognition (17 citations) and designed paired robotic devices to foster social play (16 citations). Notably, his work on adaptive behavior acquisition using affective feedback (15 citations) and the development of Pepita, a huggable robot with projected affective expressions (14 citations), highlights his innovative approach to creating empathetic, responsive machines. With over 160 total citations across his most-cited papers, Hirokawa’s research is shaping the future of assistive robotics, making technology more intuitive and supportive for vulnerable populations.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1Effect of Haptic Assistance on Learning Vehicle Reverse Parking Skills26 citations · 2014
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- 6Gait measurement by a mobile humanoid robot as a walking trainer15 citations · 2017
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