Workload, awareness and automation in multiple-robot supervision

Abstract

Using a single human to supervise multiple robots helps to address manpower constraints while deriving the benefits of multiple-robot deployment such as efficiency and improved system reliability. However, it can also induce high supervisor workload and diminish situation awareness. This article explains workload and situation awareness. It reviews various studies related to human-robot systems to illustrate the effects and causes of workload and diminished situation awareness in such systems. The article reviews and discusses the application of automation to address workload and situation-awareness concerns. It also presents the issues that the use of automation can cause, highlighting that automation must be applied with care. The article advocates the consideration of sliding autonomy for four aspects of task execution: information acquisition, information analysis, decision selection and action implementation. It additionally encourages the appreciation for recognized methods of applying and triggering automation. The hope is for robots to be equipped with adjustable autonomy across multiple aspects of task performance to create robotic systems with highly flexible autonomy configurations. While robots from such systems may have the flexibility to deal with numerous situation requirements, the research challenge is understanding if and how such flexibility will affect human workload.

Scheduling and Path-Planning for Operator Oversight of Multiple Robots

“…While the above techniques enhance the operators' control of a robot system, we focus on complex autonomous systems that require supervision and analyse how this supervising burden may be reduced. Using one operator to control multiple robots has benefits in terms of cost and control coherency but leads to a higher workload and decrease in situation awareness [29]. The human operator is often overlooked when supervising robots [30], despite their workload influencing task performance [31] and in fact having long-term negative effects on well-being [32].…”

A transformation of human operation approach to inform system design for automation

“…The research literature demonstrates the transfer of human tasks into automated tasks is essential. Yet, a transfer has not been achieved without substantial effort for the user in combination with a limited area of applications requiring detailed domain knowledge (Wong and Seet 2017;Pedersen et al 2016;Wantia et al 2016). In short, Zhao et al (2015) pointed out a knowledge gap, where the transition from an extended HTA process towards automation system design is still missing.…”

Human interaction with automated aids: Implications for robo‐advisors

“…Cognitive workload, that is, the mental exertion required to carry out a task (Bailey, Scerbo, Freeman, Mikulka, & Scott, ; Edwards, ; Kirlik, ; Parasuraman & Riley, ; Wong & Seet, ; Woods, ), can also encourage users to depend more heavily on automation. RAs can reduce cognitive workload by assisting the user to process information quickly (Nielsen, ; Ruf et al, ), by conforming to the user's expectations (Nussbaumer, Matter, Reto á Porta, et al, ; Nussbaumer, Matter, & Schwabe, ; Ruf et al, , ), and being easy to understand (Ruf et al, , ).…”