Experiences developing socially acceptable interactions for a robotic trash barrel

— Service robots in public places need to both understand environmental cues and move in ways that people can understand and predict. We developed and tested interactions with a trash barrel robot to better understand the implicit protocols for public interaction. In eight lunch-time sessions spread across two crowded campus dining destinations, we experimented with piloting our robot in Wizard of Oz fashion, initiating and responding to requests for impromptu interactions centered on collecting people's trash. Our studies progressed from open-ended experimentation to testing specific interaction strategies that seemed to evoke clear engagement and responses, both positive and negative. Observations and interviews show that a) people most welcome the robot’s presence when they need its services and it actively advertises its intent through movement; b) people create mental models of the trash barrel as having intentions and desires; c) mistakes in navigation are indicators of ...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2015
• Where: ROMAN
• Authors: Stephen Yang, Brian Ka-Jun Mok, David Sirkin, Hillary Page Ive, Rohan Maheshwari, Kerstin Fischer, Wendy Ju
• Keywords: Robotics, ROMAN 2015