Do you want to put your talents at work to develop a new coaching concept? Do you want to work on an innovative project in an international environment? Are you excellent in what you do and do you have strong social skills?

Come and apply for one of three PhD positions available on Multi-Party Virtual Coaching!

In the context of the European Horizon-2020 project Council of Coaches, the University of Twente and Roessingh Research and Development are looking for three highly motivated PhD candidates to help shape the future of virtual coaching technologies in the healthcare domain. Two positions are available at the University of Twente, and one at Roessingh Research and Development.

You will be working in a highly interdisciplinary and international research project – Council of Coaches. The project is an international collaboration between Universities and companies from the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Spain and France. The project introduces a radically new virtual coaching concept based on multiple autonomous, embodied virtual coaches, which form together a personal council that coaches older adults towards a healthy lifestyle. Each coach has his own expertise, personality and style of coaching; they might not always agree with each other, but they all share a single goal: to support the user across every aspect of well-being, including physical, social, cognitive and mental support.

The project thus aims to develop a tool in which virtual embodied coaches form a team of experts that can discuss amongst themselves and with the user how the user could improve his healthy lifestyle behaviors. The project combines state of the art 3D Virtual Avatars with language and reasoning technology and applies this to the area of lifestyle and behavior change coaching. 

Positions
The three available PhD positions focus on three distinct, but aligned sub-tasks of the project:

• Position #1: Smart Behavior Mining (University of Twente)
• Position #2: Human-Computer Interfaces (University of Twente)
• Position #3: Coaching Strategies and Knowledge Base (Roessingh Research and Development)

Coaching Strategies and Knowledge Base
This PhD position is based at Roessingh Research and Development. It is focused on a number of research questions that are on the cross-section between the technical- and social sciences. As an ideal candidate, you are expected to build up strong theoretical knowledge about motivation and coaching, as well as in personalization in Human-Computer Interaction design. You are able to apply this knowledge in the development of state of the art Human-Computer Interaction tools; formalizing and implementing coaching strategies that the virtual agents in the project should adopt. Ultimately you will be responsible for the content of the virtual embodied agents: the what, when and how of the agent’s interactions with the end-users. The position is highly interdisciplinary in nature and as such you are expected to collaborate and work together with our varied team of researchers and engineers. You have a strong technical background as well as a strong desire to build tools that can be used by- and offer real benefits to its users.

You hold a MSc. in Computer Science, Human Computer Interaction, Artificial Intelligence or related field. You can demonstrate a strong technical background in software design and ideally artificial intelligence and/or language technologies. You are willing to familiarize yourself with theories of motivation and coaching and apply these in your work. Communication skills and the ability to work in a multi-disciplinary team are required. Programming skills are required; Java is a plus. As a PhD researcher you are highly responsible, capable of planning and executing your work individually when required.

For more information
Roessingh Research and Development: www.rrd.nl

Contact Harm op den Akker: h.opdenakker@rrd.nl 

Write your motivation letter, clearly indicating which of the three positions you are applying for before July 24th 2017. Attach your CV and upload your application

A challenging opportunity to perform PhD research in the context of a highly ambitious EU-funded project. At Roessingh Research and Development (RRD) we offer a full-time contract for a duration of 3 years (36 hours per week) with a starting gross monthly salary of €2567,- in the first year. The contract is governed by the collective labor agreement ‘Hospitals’ with excellent conditions. Indicative starting date is September or October 2017.

The University of Twente. We stand for life sciences and technology. High tech and human touch. Education and research that matter. New technology which drives change, innovation and progress in society. The University of Twente is the only campus university in the Netherlands; divided over five faculties we provide more than fifty educational programmes. The University of Twente has a strong focus on personal development and talented researchers are given scope for carrying out pioneering research.

The faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science (EEMCS) comprises three disciplines that shape Information and Communication Technology. ICT is more than communication. In almost every product we use mathematics, electronics and computer technology and ICT now contributes to all of societies' activities. The faculty works together intensively with industrial partners and researchers in the Netherlands and abroad and conducts extensive research for external commissioning parties and funders. The research which enjoys a high profile both at home and internationally, has been accommodated in the multidisciplinary research institutes MESA+, CTIT and MIRA.