Stuart Reeves is an Associate Professor at the School of Computer Science, University of Nottingham, UK. He develops hybrid approaches that blend Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research with studies grounded in ethnomethodology and conversation analysis to understand how digital technologies and infrastructures become praxeologically enmeshed within the organisation of everyday life. This research approach engages with critical technology design practices, and with conceptual implications for designers and developers of interactive systems. Recently Stuart's work has been preoccupied with examining 'real world' applications of Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) and Human-Robot Collaboration (e.g., Pelikan et al. 2024, Reeves et al. 2025, Reyes-Cruz et al. 2026), and what this means for robot designers via design frameworks (Pelikan et al. 2025). Stuart leads the Social Interaction and Technology (SIT) special interest group at Nottingham.
Robots in Public: Understanding New Orders of Interaction
Recently we have seen robots being deployed in public places as fully operational commercial services (e.g., for delivery or transport). In this talk I want to discuss the human consequences of this 'at street level', and how it relates to the organisation of interaction in public and the local urban environment. Instead of focusing on the capabilities of robots themselves, I will examine how people- whether on food, in cars, or pushing buggies- make sense of and respond to robots as they encounter then when going about their everyday lives. On the basis of this, the talk will also explore what to make of such studies and how they can shape thinking about public robots and their design.