Methodology and themes of human-robot interaction: a growing research field

Original article can be found at: http://www.intechweb.org/journal.php?id=3 Distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License. Users are free to read, print, download and use the content or part of it so long as the original author(s) and source are correctly credited.This article discusses challenges of Human-Robot Interaction, which is a highly inter- and multidisciplinary area. Themes that are important in current research in this lively and growing field are identified and selected work relevant to these themes is discussed.Peer reviewe

Assessing Graphical Robot Aids for Interactive Co-working

The shift towards more collaborative working between humans and robots increases the need for improved interfaces. Alongside robust measures to ensure safety and task performance, humans need to gain the confidence in robot co-operators to enable true collaboration. This research investigates how graphical signage can support human–robot co-working, with the intention of increased productivity. Participants are required to co-work with a KUKA iiwa lightweight manipulator on a manufacturing task. The three conditions in the experiment differ in the signage presented to the participants – signage relevant to the task, irrelevant to the task, or no signage. A change between three conditions is expected in anxiety and negative attitudes towards robots; error rate; response time; and participants’ complacency, suggested by facial expressions. In addition to understanding how graphical languages can support human–robot co-working, this study provides a basis for further collaborative research to explore human–robot co-working in more detail

A Systematic Literature Review of User Experience Evaluation Scales for Human-Robot Collaboration

In the last decade, the field of Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) has received much attention from both research institutions and industries. Robot technologies are in fact deployed in many different areas (e.g., industrial processes, people assistance) to support an effective collaboration between humans and robots. In this transdisciplinary context, User eXperience (UX) has inevitably to be considered to achieve an effective HRC, namely to allow the robots to better respond to the users’ needs and thus improve the interaction quality. The present paper reviews the evaluation scales used in HRC scenarios, focusing on the application context and evaluated aspects. In particular, a systematic review was conducted based on the following questions: (RQ1) which evaluation scales are adopted within the HRI scenario with collaborative tasks?, and (RQ2) how the UX and user satisfaction are assessed?. The records analysis highlighted that the UX aspects are not sufficiently examined in the current HRC design practice, particularly in the industrial field. This is most likely due to a lack of standardized scales. To respond to this recognized need, a set of dimensions to be considered in a new UX evaluation scale were proposed

AN ADAPTATION OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ANXIETY SCALE INTO TURKISH: RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY STUDY

The widespread use of artificial intelligence (AI) has been growing in various fields. AI is defined as human-like automation in place of human beings that can operate many functions based on some level of intelligence. In education, AI offers powerful pedagogical tools that can help enhance instructional quality. Given the inevitable advancements of AI in education, this study aims to investigate teachers’ AI anxiety levels based on various demographic factors. For this purpose, the AI Anxiety Scale is adapted into Turkish, which provides a good fit of the model to the data for the construct validity. Moreover, the reliability coefficients of the scale show strong evidence of consistency in teachers’ responses to the items. For sociotechnical blindness dimension, male and female teachers do not show any significant differences. However, for learning, job replacement, AI configuration dimensions and the total scale, female teachers are more anxious towards AI than male teachers. Moreover, there is no difference observed based on degree levels teachers hold. Additionally, anxiety levels of teachers are not related to teachers’ age and years of experience in teaching

Evaluation of an Empathic Robotic Tutor for Geography and Sustainability Learning

This paper discusses the evaluation of an empathic robotic tutor, developed in the EMOTE project. It also argues for the adoption of a new evaluation approach for educational robots, called situated evaluation

Customer Responses to Service Robots – Comparing Human-Robot Interaction with Human-Human Interaction

This paper investigates how service failures affect customers by comparing human-robot interactions with human-human interactions. More specifically, it compares customers’ satisfaction in a service robot interaction depending on a service failure with the customers’ satisfaction in a frontline service employee interaction. On a theoretical basis, extant literature on the uncanny valley paradigm proposed that service robots would create lower satisfaction than human frontline employees would. However, I find that service robots could keep up with human frontline employees. Based on an extensive literature research on service failures, I propose that customer satisfaction after a service failure declines far less for a human frontline employee compared with a service robot. Nevertheless, I find evidence that service robots create even higher customer satisfaction than human frontline employees after the exactly similar service failure. I base my findings on an experimental laboratory study with 120 student participants and the service robot “Pepper” from Softbank Corp

An Acceptance Test for Assistive Robots

[EN] Socially assistive robots have been used in the care of elderly or dependent people, particularly with patients suffering from neurological diseases, like autism and dementia. There are some proposals, but there are no standardized mechanisms for assessing a particular robot’s suitability for specific therapy. This paper reports the evaluation of an acceptance test for assistive robots applied to people with dementia. The proposed test focuses on evaluating the suitability of a robot during therapy sessions. The test measures the rejection of the robot by the patient based on observational data. This test would recommend what kind of robot and what functionalities can be used in therapy. The novelty of this approach is the formalization of a specific validation process that only considers the reaction of the person to whom the robot is applied, and may be used more effectively than existing tests, which may not be adequate for evaluating assistance robots. The test’s feasibility was tested by applying it to a set of dementia patients in a specialized care facility.SICentro para el Desarrollo Tecnológico y la Innovación : Proyecto DIA4RA (Desarrollo de Inteligencia Artificial para Robótica Asistencial