961 research outputs found
Collaborative Robots and Tangled Passages of Tactile-Affects
Collaborative robots are increasingly entering industrial contexts and workflows. These contexts are not just locations for production, they are vibrant social and sensory environments. For better or for worse their entry brings potential to reorganize established tactile and affective dynamics that encompass production processes. There is still much to be learned about these highly contextual and complex dynamics in HRI research and the design of industrial robotics; common approaches in industrial collaborative robotics are restricted to evaluating ‘effective interface design’ whereas methods that seek to measure ‘affective touch’ have limited application to these industrial domains. This paper offers an extended analytical framework and methodological approach to deepen understandings of affect and touch beyond emotional responses to direct human-robot interactions. These distinct contributions are grounded in fieldwork in a glass factory with newly installed collaborative robots. They are illustrated through an ethnographic narrative that traces the emergence and circulation of affect, across
material, experiential
and
social
planes. Beyond this single case ‘tangled passages of tactile-affects’ is offered as novel and valuable concept, that is distinct from the notion of ‘affective touch’, and holds potential to generate holistic and nuanced understandings of how human experiences can be affected by the introduction of new robots in ‘the wild’
Preparing for Industrial Collaborative Robots: A Literature Review of Technology Readiness and Acceptance Models
This item is only available electronically.Collaborative robots (cobots) are an emerging technology that are increasingly being
introduced into organisations. However, research investigating employee attitudes towards, or
assessment of factors predicting acceptance of cobots is limited. A literature review was
conducted to identify reliable and parsimonious models of technology acceptance that would
hold relevance when applied to cobots. Understanding and facilitating employee acceptance
of such technology is important if the improved productivity, job satisfaction and cost savings
associated with its implementation are to be achieved. The Technology Readiness Index
(Parasuraman, 2000) and Technology Acceptance Model (Davis, 1989) were considered most
appropriate as a starting point to empirically explore cobot acceptance.Thesis (M.Psych(Organisational & Human Factors)) -- University of Adelaide, School of Psychology, 201
Trust in Construction AI-Powered Collaborative Robots: A Qualitative Empirical Analysis
Construction technology researchers and forward-thinking companies are
experimenting with collaborative robots (aka cobots), powered by artificial
intelligence (AI), to explore various automation scenarios as part of the
digital transformation of the industry. Intelligent cobots are expected to be
the dominant type of robots in the future of work in construction. However, the
black-box nature of AI-powered cobots and unknown technical and psychological
aspects of introducing them to job sites are precursors to trust challenges. By
analyzing the results of semi-structured interviews with construction
practitioners using grounded theory, this paper investigates the
characteristics of trustworthy AI-powered cobots in construction. The study
found that while the key trust factors identified in a systematic literature
review -- conducted previously by the authors -- resonated with the field
experts and end users, other factors such as financial considerations and the
uncertainty associated with change were also significant barriers against
trusting AI-powered cobots in construction.Comment: 2023 ASCE International Conference on Computing in Civil Engineering
(I3CE
A Concept for User-Centered Delegation of Abstract High-Level Tasks to Cobots for Flexible Lot Sizes
Technical advances in collaborative robots (cobots) are making them
increasingly attractive to companies. However, many human operators are not
trained to program complex machines. Instead, humans are used to communicating
with each other on a task-based level rather than through specific
instructions, as is common with machines. The gap between low-level
instruction-based and high-level task-based communication leads to low values
for usability scores of teach pendant programming. As a solution, we propose a
task-based interaction concept that allows human operators to delegate a
complex task to a machine without programming by specifying a task via
triplets. The concept is based on task decomposition and a reasoning system
using a cognitive architecture. The approach is evaluated in an industrial use
case where mineral cast basins have to be sanded by a cobot in a crafts
enterprise
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Post-automation: report from an international workshop
The purpose of this report is to share lessons from an international research workshop dedicated to post- automation. Twenty-seven researchers from eleven different countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe, met at the Science Policy Research Unit at Sussex University on 11-13 September 2019, where we discussed empirical research papers and explored post-automation in group activities. We write this report primarily for researchers, but also for activists and policy advisors looking for more imaginative approaches to governing technology, work and sustainability in society, compared to those dominant agendas adapting automatically to the interests behind automation.
The report is structured as follows. Section two introduces the workshop topic and papers presented, and which leads into two related areas that became a focus for discussion. First, some challenges in the foundations
of automation theory (section three). And second, post-automation as a more constructive proposition to the challenges of automation, and that is happening right now (section four). Section five summarises some key points arising from the workshop, based on empirical observations from the margins of digital technology development, and that give both a flavour of the workshop and help elaborate the post-automation proposition. Some analytical and strategic themes are discussed in section six. We conclude in section seven with proposals for a post-automation agenda
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