Communicating Dominance in a Nonanthropomorphic Robot Using Locomotion

Abstract

Dominance is a key aspect of interpersonal relationships. To what extent do nonverbal indicators related to dominance status translate to a nonanthropomorphic robot? An experiment (N = 25) addressed whether a mobile robot's motion style can influence people's perceptions of its status. Using concepts from improv theater literature, we developed two motion styles across three scenarios (robot makes lateral motions, approaches, and departs) to communicate a robot's dominance status through nonverbal expression. In agreement with the literature, participants described a motion style that was fast, in the foreground, and more animated as higher status than a motion style that was slow, in the periphery, and less animated. Participants used fewer negative emotion words to describe the robot with the purportedly high-status movements versus the purportedly low-status movements, but used more negative emotion words to describe the robot when it made departing motions that occurred in the same style. This result provides evidence that guidelines from improvisational theater for using nonverbal expression to perform interpersonal status can be applied to influence perception of a nonanthropomorphic robot's status, thus suggesting that useful models for more complicated behaviors might similarly be derived from performance literature and theory.

Let Me Show You Your New Home: Studying the Effect of Proxemic-awareness of Robots on Users’ First Impressions

“…They can therefore not only react to proxemic behavior of humans, but they can also show active spatial behavior in multiple dimensions and thus enable a wider range of interaction possibilities. In a recent work Li et al [19] have taken inspiration from improv theater studied how a non-anthropomorphic robot can use locomotion only for social expression (i.e., dominance). In sum, related work strongly indicates that a mobile companion robot, which acts in a proxemic-aware manner will result in users perceiving them as more alive, experience more hedonic qualities, and ultimately the robot will leave a better first impression than a version which is mobile and autonomous but not proxemic.…”

The Design of Robothings : Non-Anthropomorphic and Non-Verbal Robots to Promote Children’s Collaboration Through Play

“…An opposite strand of HRI research focuses on designing robot communication that is not at all or less human-like [151,228,356,355]. To this end, researchers have resorted to a plethora of techniques.…”

“…Animation principles [295] and animation techniques [151] have been used to imbue abstract non-anthropomorphic robots with social behavior as animators do with virtually anything they draw. Theatre [203] and improvisation techniques [332,228] have been adopted to instill expressivity into low/nonanthropomorphic robots Designers have delved into the design of robot introduction behaviors optimized for low-anthropomorphic specific morphologies, achieving social communication with modalities that are not human-like [191]. A common denominator of these approaches is designing to communicate in 'human terms' rather than in human-like ways.…”

“…Body movements and locomotion enable low-anthropomorphic robots to communicate their intentions, internal states, and emotions, contributing to people's comprehension and acceptance of the robot [151,204,207,299]. Recent studies have found that simple non-anthropomorphic motion of a robot can influence behaviors and interpersonal dynamics [184,153,299] and communicate complex traits of robots [228].…”

“…Researchers have explored the role of motion styles (the way a robot performs an action) in low-to nonanthropomorphic robots [206,333]. Studies show that a motion style on top of a non-anthropomorphic robot's task actions influences how people understand the robot's behaviors and attribute intention, social qualities, and other characteristics to the robot [53,207,228,302]. In particular, a motion style appears to modify or increase the communication and perception of an action's intention (e.g., the speed and curvature of robot locomotion (e.g., a Roomba vacuum cleaner) influences the perceived affective state of the robot).…”