Introduction to the Skills Project and its Theoretical Framework

SKILLS is a FP6 Integrated Project dealing with the acquisition, interpretation, storing and transfer of human skill by means of multimodal interfaces, Robotics, Virtual Environments (VE) technologies and Interaction Design methodologies. SKILLS intends to introduce a novel approach to skill capturing, transfer and assessment based on enactive paradigms of interaction between the human operator and the interface system devoted to mimic task conditions. SKILLS promotes (i) enactive knowledge and enactive training, (ii) during skill acquisition and transfer, (iii) relying on intrinsic, affordance-based metrics, and using (iv) technological interfaces as accelerators, (v) available to multiple users (trainees, trainers). We provide examples showing how each of these concepts influences our perspective and can be translated into concrete actions in research and innovation.