Mobile Remote Presence Enhanced with Contactless Object Manipulation

Abstract

A telepresence robot is a mobile telecommunication device, remotely controlled by its "pilot", which supports an embodied presence of the pilot in a different location (the "local setting"). A common problem with telepresence robots is their limited capability of interacting with the physical environment. A potential solution, explored in the present study, is supporting "double remote control" interaction, that is, making it possible for the pilot, in addition to remotely controlling the robot, to also remotely control objects in the local setting. In the study we enacted meaningful scenarios of employing telepresence robots with and without double remote control capabilities. The evidence collected in the study allows us to tentatively assess the effects of double remote control interaction on user experience and social context. Issues for future research are discussed.

Performance, Power, and Place: User Experience of Contactless Object Manipulation in Robotic Telepresence

“…A small-scale pre-study, reported in an earlier work-in-progress paper [15], was performed to test our research methodology and prototyping approach. Several changes in the method, including a revised procedure and rating scales, and the use of a different MRP system, were made as a result of the pre-study.…”

“…The command was forwarded to the Wizard, who discreetly manipulated the object in question either manually (doors, blinds, and lights) or through a remote control (TV and toy car). The Wizard was pre-trained and acted in this role in the pre-study [15]. In all cases, except for opening doors, the Wizard could stay out of the robot's view by taking into account the robot's camera angle.…”

“…A set of 14 seven-point semantic differential scales was employed after each of the conditions: boring-fun, unsafesafe, strange-familiar, slow-fast, difficult-easy, unusable-usable, constraining-liberating, stressful-relaxing, unresponsive-responsive, unreal-real, aggressive-peaceful, ugly-beautiful, useless-useful, and machine like-human like. The scales, specifically focusing on the impact of DRC on user experience, were constructed from a set of adjectives, produced by participants in our pre-study, who were HCI experts, to describe their experience with both DRC and non-DRC conditions [15]. Furthermore, four five-point paired comparison scales, administered after completing all tasks, were used to compare DRC and non-DRC according to efficiency, understanding the other participant, personal connection to the other participant, and overall subjective preference.…”

“…The solution makes it possible for the pilot to switch the lights in the setting without the need for the MRP system to make physical contact with the light switch. To the best of our knowledge, our previous work-in-progress paper introducing DRC [15] was the first one to propose the solution. In this paper, we present an empirical study, in which we tested a Wizard of Oz-style prototype implementing the concept of DRC.…”

Robots in Contexts

“…Design concepts that can help more efficiently integrate humanrobot interaction into physical and social contexts (e.g., double remote interaction, [9]) will be discussed by the participants.…”