18 accepted papers
Robot motion impacts onlooker perception of robots' social and functional goals, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Neighboring fields such as dance can help roboticists understand the impacts of motion using tools like the Laban efforts, one of the primary modes of annotating and interpretin
Young children with motor disabilities face barriers and delays to learning motor skills such as walking. Pediatric body-weight support harness systems (BWSHes) are a newer technology for helping young children to practice supported motor skills. Incorporating an assistive robot to mediate BWSH inte…
The rise in prevalence of AI-enabled technologies (from voice assistants to social robots) has not yet been accompanied by an analogous mastery of computer-mediated humor. Although humans often use jokes to repair interactions and navigate uncomfortable scenarios, social robots in similar roles typi…
One challenge in human-robot interaction is selecting communication methods that fit a given robotic system and avoid overpromising. For example, verbal speech provides a clear and easy-to-understand communication method, but can inflate expectations of robot abilities. Is verbal speech the ultimate
Young children with motor disabilities face barriers and delays to learning motor skills such as walking. Pediatric body-weight support harness systems (BWSHes) are a newer technology for helping young children to practice supported motor skills. Incorporating an assistive robot to mediate BWSH inte
Mobile manipulators — robots with a moving base and an arm for grasping objects — are becoming more common in human-populated environments, such as hospitals, warehouses, and even homes. Yet most mobile manipulators lack clear ways to communicate intent to human interlocutors in a continuous, social
The rise in prevalence of AI-enabled technologies (from voice assistants to social robots) has not yet been accompanied by an analogous mastery of computer-mediated humor. Although humans often use jokes to repair interactions and navigate uncomfortable scenarios, social robots in similar roles typi
While robot sound is known to impact perceptions of robots, little research to date has addressed the topic of robot sound. In particular, there are few in-person studies surrounding the topic. To expand existing robotic sound research, we conducted an in-person empirical study with $N=30$ participa…
Children around the world are growing more sedentary over time, which leads to considerable accompanying wellness challenges. Pilot results from our research group have shown that robots may offer something different or better than other developmentally appropriate toys when it comes to motivating p…
Robot-mediated interventions are one promising and novel approach for encouraging motor exploration in young children, but knowledge about the effectiveness of toy-like features for child-robot interaction is limited. We were interested in understanding the characteristics of current toys to inform…
Transformative robot sound yields perceptual, functional, and social benefits in human-robot interactions, but broader research and implementation related to this topic is impeded by the lack of a common sound generation system for robots. Such a system could enable a wide array of situated robot so
Effective social robots should leverage humor’s unique ability to improve relationship connections and dispel stress, but current robots possess limited (if any) humorous abilities. In this paper, we aim to supplement one aspect of autonomous robots by giving robotic systems the ability to "read the…
Lovable robots in movies regularly beep, chirp, and whirr, yet robots in the real world rarely deploy such sounds. Despite preliminary work supporting the perceptual and objective benefits of intentionally-produced robot sound, relatively little research is ongoing in this area. In this paper, we sy…
All robots create consequential sound—sound produced as a result of the robot’s mechanisms—yet little work has explored how sound impacts human-robot interaction. Recent work shows that the sound of different robot mechanisms affects perceived competence, trust, human-likeness, and discomfort. Howev…
Telepresence robots can empower people to work, play, and learn along with others, despite geographic distance. To investigate the use of telepresence robots for remote attendance of university-level classes, we conducted a study in four courses at our university. We compared student experiences att
Everyday robots are emerging in contexts from household chores to entertainment, and an accompanying need arises to understand perceptions of these systems. We propose a sleek 2D hanging pen plotter as a useful tool for both furthering art and studying human responses to ambient everyday robots. Asp
More than ever, people spend the workday seated in front of a computer, which contributes to health issues caused by excess sedentary behavior. While breaking up long periods of sitting can alleviate these issues, no scalable interventions have had long-term success in motivating activity breaks at…
All over the world, people find joy and amusement in playing hand-clapping games such as “Pat-a-cake” and “Slide.” Thus, as robots enter everyday human spaces and work together with people, we see potential for them to entertain, engage, and assist humans through cooperative clapping games. This pap…