Thiago Freitas dos Santos

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About

Thiago Freitas dos Santos is a researcher whose work sits at the compelling intersection of human-robot interaction, social robotics, and affective computing. His scholarship explores how robots can be designed to engage meaningfully with people through personality, emotion, and conversation — questions that grow increasingly urgent as robots become embedded in everyday environments. His 2014 study on behavioral personas for pet robots, which has garnered 26 citations, represents a foundational contribution to understanding how anthropomorphic and zoomorphic design choices shape the way users perceive and relate to robotic companions. By grounding robot personality in observable behavioral frameworks, Santos helped advance a more systematic approach to robot character design. His more recent work, published in 2025, pushes further into the dynamics of sustained engagement, investigating the affective and conversational factors that determine whether users choose to continue interacting with humanoid social robots. This student-centered study reflects a growing commitment to applied, context-sensitive research that prioritizes real user experiences over abstract design principles. Across his career, Santos has consistently asked how robots can move beyond novelty to become genuinely meaningful social partners — a contribution that resonates deeply with students and practitioners shaping the future of human-robot collaboration.