# Interactive Imitation Learning for Dexterous Robotic Manipulation: Challenges and Perspectives -- A Survey

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.00098 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.00098/

## Key facts

- Cited by 4 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Robot manipulation imitation learning, one of 13 directions in Offline RL and imitation learning from data.
- Builds on 90 of its 171 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 30 May 2025.

## Placed in

- Offline RL and imitation learning from data / [Robot manipulation imitation learning](https://mlsanity.com/offlinerl/robot-manipulation-imitation-learning/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 90)

- [Bootstrap your own latent: A new approach to self-supervised Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.07733/) (2020)
- [Deep reinforcement learning from human preferences](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.03741/) (2017)
- [RT-2: Vision-Language-Action Models Transfer Web Knowledge to Robotic Control](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.15818/) (2023)
- [Diffusion Policy: Visuomotor Policy Learning via Action Diffusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.04137/) (2023)
- [RT-1: Robotics Transformer for Real-World Control at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.06817/) (2022)
- [Learning Fine-Grained Bimanual Manipulation with Low-Cost Hardware](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.13705/) (2023)
- [Soft Actor-Critic Algorithms and Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.05905/) (2018)
- [GR00T N1: An Open Foundation Model for Generalist Humanoid Robots](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.14734/) (2025)
- [Solving Rubik's Cube with a Robot Hand](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1910.07113/) (2019)
- [Learning Complex Dexterous Manipulation with Deep Reinforcement Learning and Demonstrations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1709.10087/) (2017)
- [R3M: A Universal Visual Representation for Robot Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.12601/) (2022)
- [Learning Dexterous In-Hand Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1808.00177/) (2018)
- [AWAC: Accelerating Online Reinforcement Learning with Offline Datasets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.09359/) (2020)
- [An Algorithmic Perspective on Imitation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1811.06711/) (2018)
- [Implicit Behavioral Cloning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2109.00137/) (2021)
- [Universal Manipulation Interface: In-The-Wild Robot Teaching Without In-The-Wild Robots](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.10329/) (2024)
- [Overcoming Exploration in Reinforcement Learning with Demonstrations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1709.10089/) (2017)
- [Behavior Transformers: Cloning k modes with one stone](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.11251/) (2022)
- [HG-DAgger: Interactive Imitation Learning with Human Experts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.02890/) (2018)
- [Imitating Human Behaviour with Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.10677/) (2023)
- [Reinforcement learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.10369/) (2024)
- [DexMV: Imitation Learning for Dexterous Manipulation from Human Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.05877/) (2021)
- [DexCap: Scalable and Portable Mocap Data Collection System for Dexterous Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.07788/) (2024)
- [Interactive Learning from Policy-Dependent Human Feedback](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1701.06049/) (2017)
- [What Matters in Language Conditioned Robotic Imitation Learning over Unstructured Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.06252/) (2022)
- [VIOLA: Imitation Learning for Vision-Based Manipulation with Object Proposal Priors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2210.11339/) (2022)
- [Multimodal Diffusion Transformer: Learning Versatile Behavior from Multimodal Goals](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.05996/) (2024)
- [Human-in-the-Loop Imitation Learning using Remote Teleoperation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.06733/) (2020)
- [Robot Learning on the Job: Human-in-the-Loop Autonomy and Learning During Deployment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.08416/) (2022)
- [VideoDex: Learning Dexterity from Internet Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.04498/) (2022)

## Built on by (most cited first, 4 of 4)

- [A Survey on Imitation Learning for Contact-Rich Tasks in Robotics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.13498/) (2025)
- [FlowCorrect: Efficient Interactive Correction of Generative Flow Policies for Robotic Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.22056/) (2026)
- [Hand-in-the-Loop: Improving VLA Policies for Dexterous Manipulation via Seamless Hand-Arm Intervention](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.15157/) (2026)
- [MoRI: Mixture of RL and IL Experts for Long-Horizon Manipulation Tasks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.10165/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Dexterous manipulation is a crucial yet highly complex challenge in humanoid robotics, demanding precise, adaptable, and sample-efficient learning methods. As humanoid robots are usually designed to operate in human-centric environments and interact with everyday objects, mastering dexterous manipulation is critical for real-world deployment. Traditional approaches, such as reinforcement learning and imitation learning, have made significant strides, but they often struggle due to the unique challenges of real-world dexterous manipulation, including high-dimensional control, limited training data, and covariate shift. This survey provides a comprehensive overview of these challenges and reviews existing learning-based methods for real-world dexterous manipulation, spanning imitation learning, reinforcement learning, and hybrid approaches. A promising yet underexplored direction is interactive imitation learning, where human feedback actively refines a robots behavior during training. While interactive imitation learning has shown success in various robotic tasks, its application to dexterous manipulation remains limited. To address this gap, we examine current interactive imitation learning techniques applied to other robotic tasks and discuss how these methods can be adapted to enhance dexterous manipulation. By synthesizing state-of-the-art research, this paper highlights key challenges, identifies gaps in current methodologies, and outlines potential directions for leveraging interactive imitation learning to improve dexterous robotic skills.