Embodied conversations: performance and the design of a robotic dancing partner

Wallis, Mick; Popat, Sita; McKinney, Joslin; Bryden, John; Hogg, David C.

doi:10.1016/j.destud.2009.09.001

Cited by 21 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…These robots have wheels, rather than legs, to avoid the problem of balancing, as well as a small front base, to allow the human to get close enough to the robot for the required dance embrace. The SpiderCrab robot is a robotic arm that uses improvisational dance to interact with its human partners [38]. Dancers feel that because the robot responds to their spontaneous movements, it behaves as a real human dance partner might.…”

Section: Robot Touch For Social Enjoymentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Softness, Warmth, and Responsiveness Improve Robot Hugs

Block

Kuchenbecker

2018

Int J of Soc Robotics

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Hugs are one of the first forms of contact and affection humans experience. Due to their prevalence and health benefits, roboticists are naturally interested in having robots one day hug humans as seamlessly as humans hug other humans. This project's purpose is to evaluate human responses to different robot physical characteristics and hugging behaviors. Specifically, we aim to test the hypothesis that a soft, warm, touch-sensitive PR2 humanoid robot can provide humans with satisfying hugs by matching both their hugging pressure and their hugging duration. Thirty relatively young and rather technical participants experienced and evaluated twelve hugs with the robot, divided into three randomly ordered trials that focused on physical robot characteristics (single factor, three levels) and nine randomly ordered trials with low, medium, and high hug pressure and duration (two factors, three levels each). Analysis of the results showed that people significantly prefer soft, warm hugs over hard, cold hugs. Furthermore, users prefer hugs that physically squeeze them and release immediately when they are ready for the hug to end. Taking part in the experiment also significantly increased positive user opinions of robots and robot use.

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Section: Robot Touch For Social Enjoymentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Softness, Warmth, and Responsiveness Improve Robot Hugs

Block

Kuchenbecker

2018

Int J of Soc Robotics

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“…Using embodied systems to support movement in the same space has been previously discussed in embodied interaction research [36] and human-robot interaction [37]. Our work extends this by highlighting the opportunity of autonomous robots to support exertion actions by utilizing the shared space.…”

Section: Tactic 3: Utilize Not Fight the Robot's Secondary Movementsmentioning

confidence: 66%

Jogging with a Quadcopter

Mueller

Muirhead

2015

Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

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Jogging is a popular exertion activity. The abundance of jogging apps suggests to us that joggers can appreciate the opportunity for technology to support the jogging experience. We want to take this investigation a step further by exploring if, and how, robotic systems can support the jogging experience. We designed and built a flying robotic system, a quadcopter, as a jogging companion and studied its use with 13 individual joggers. By analyzing their experiences, we derived three design dimensions that describe a design space for flying robotic jogging companions: Perceived Control, Focus and Bodily Interaction. Additionally, we articulate a series of design tactics, described by these dimensions, to guide the design of future systems. With this work we hope to inspire and guide designers interested in creating robotic systems to support exertion experiences.

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“…However, Breazeal et al (2003) only considered fully autonomous robots, while this effort shows that the robot does not have to be the improvising party. The experiences with A Midsummer Night's Dream show that improvisation is required both implicitly (to compensate for timing, actor variations, etc., also seen in Apostolos et al 1996;Wallis et al 2010) and explicitly (to compensate for technological failures, such as the crashes in Sect. 4.8).…”

Section: Affect From Explicit Affective Expressionsmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…), affect and expressiveness of robots (Lin et al 2009;Hanson 2009a, 2009b;Perkowski et al 2005), experimental aesthetics (Apostolos et al 1996;Dompierre and Laurendeau 2006;Iida et al 2008;Hanson 2009a, 2009b;Ohya et al 1996;Paricio García and Moreno Aróstegui 2007), or some combination. The majority of productions exploring affect and expressiveness of robots have concentrated on improving the physical expressiveness of humanoid robots (Lin et al 2009;Mavridis and Hanson 2009a;Perkowski et al 2005), on creating the sensing needed for awareness (Lin et al 2009;Perkowski et al 2005), or computational structures (Burke et al 2006;Hanson 2009a, 2009b;Wallis et al 2010). The production of A Midsummer Night's Dream was motivated by the desire to understand affect and expressiveness of non-humanoid robots, using commercially available robots designed for flight stability with limited degrees of freedom.…”

Section: Previous and Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (with flying robots)

et al. 2010

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Seven flying robot "fairies" joined human actors in the Texas A&M production of William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. The production was a collaboration between the departments of Computer Science and Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Theater Arts. The collaboration was motivated by two assertions. First, that the performing arts have principles for creating believable agents that will transfer to robots. Second, the theater is a natural testbed for evaluating the response of untrained human groups (both actors and the audience) to robots interacting with humans in shared spaces, i.e., were believable agents created? The production used two types of unmanned aerial vehicles, an AirRobot 100-b quadrotor platform about the size of a large pizza pan, and six E-flite Blade MCX palm-sized toy helicopters. The robots were used as alter egos for fairies in the play; the robots did not replace any actors, instead they were paired with them. The insertion of robots into the production was not widely advertised so the audience was the typical theatergoing demographic, not one consisting of people solely interested technology. The use of radio-controlled unmanned aerial vehicles provides insights into what types of autonomy are needed to create appropriate affective interactions with untrained human groups. The observations from the four weeks of practice and eight performances contribute (1) a taxonomy and methods for creating affect exchanges between robots and untrained human groups, (2) the importance of improvisation within robot theater, (3) insights into how untrained human groups form expectations about robots, and (4) awareness of the importance of safety and reliability as a design constraint for public engagement with robot platforms. The taxonomy captures that apparent affect can be created without explicit affective behaviors by the robot, but requires talented actors to convey the situation or express reactions. The audience's response to robot crashes was a function of whether they had the opportunity to observe how the actors reacted to robot crashes on stage, suggesting that pre-existing expectations must be taken into account in the design of autonomy. Furthermore, it appears that the public expect robots to be more reliable (an expectation of consumer product hardening) and safe (an expectation from product liability) than the current capabilities and this may be a major challenge or even legal barrier for introducing robots into shared public spaces. These contributions are expected to inform design strategies for increasing public engagement with robot platforms through affect, and shows the value of arts-based approaches to public encounters with robots both for generating design strategies and for evaluation.

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Embodied conversations: performance and the design of a robotic dancing partner

Cited by 21 publications

References 16 publications

Softness, Warmth, and Responsiveness Improve Robot Hugs

Softness, Warmth, and Responsiveness Improve Robot Hugs

Jogging with a Quadcopter

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (with flying robots)

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