Jered Hendrik Vroon

Dynamics of social positioning patterns in group-robot interactions

When a mobile robot interacts with a group of people, it has to consider its position and orientation. We introduce a novel study aimed at generating hypotheses on suitable behavior for such social positioning, explicitly focusing on interaction with small groups of users and allowing for the temporal and social dynamics inherent in most interactions. In particular, the interactions we look at are approach, converse and retreat. In this study, groups of three participants and a telepresence robot (controlled remotely by a fourth participant) solved a task together while we collected quantitative and qualitative data, including tracking of positioning/orientation and ratings of the behaviors used. In the data we observed a variety of patterns that can be extrapolated to hypotheses using inductive reasoning. One such pattern/hypothesis is that a (telepresence) robot could pass through a group when retreating, without this affecting how comfortable that retreat is for the group members. Another is that a group will rate the position/orientation of a (telepresence) robot as more comfortable when it is aimed more at the center of that group.

Responsive Social Agents

How can we generate appropriate behavior for social artificial agents? A common approach is to (1) establish with controlled experiments which action is most appropriate in which setting, and (2) select actions based on this knowledge and an estimate of the setting. This approach faces challenges, as it can be very hard to acquire and reason with all the required knowledge. Estimating the setting is challenging too, as many relevant aspects of the setting (e.g. personality of the interactee) can be unobservable. We formally describe an alternative approach that can handle these challenges; responsiveness. This is the idea that a social agent can utilize the many feedback cues given in social interactions to continuously adapt its behavior to something more appropriate. We theoretically discuss the relative advantages and disadvantages of these two approaches, which allows for more explicitly considering their application in social agents.

Responsive Social Positioning Behaviors for Semi-Autonomous Telepresence Robots

Social interaction with a mobile robot requires the establishment of appropriate social positioning behaviors. Previous work has focused mostly on general and static rules that can be applied to robotics, such as proxemics. How can we deal effectively and efficiently with the dynamic positioning common in social interactions, such as the leaning behaviors we observed in conversations between elderly with hearing problems? We propose to refine the existing approach by having a robot continuously adapt its positioning behavior based on the reactions people give to its earlier actions - i.e. by making the robot responsive to feedback cues. To implement such a responsive system, we will have to develop systems for the detection of these feedback cues, as well as strategies to adapt the robots behavior based on them.

I would like to get close to you: Making robot personal space invasion less intrusive with a social gaze cue

How can a social robot get physically close to the people it needs to interact with? We investigated the effect of a social gaze cue by a human-sized mobile robot on the effects of personal space invasion by that robot. In our 2\(\,\times \,\)2 between-subject experiment, our robot would approach our participants (n = 83), with/without personal space invasion, and with/without a social gaze cue. With a questionnaire, we measured subjective perception of warmth, competence, and comfort after such an interaction. In addition, we used on-board sensors and a tracking system to measure the dynamics of social positioning behavior. While we did find significant differences in the social positioning dynamics of the participants, no such effect was found upon quantitative analysis of perception of the robot. In a subsequent inductive analysis we further investigated these results, our findings suggesting that the social cue did play a role for the participants – particularly related to their perceived safety.

Blame my telepresence robot joint effect of proxemics and attribution on interpersonal attraction

When remote users share autonomy with a telepresence robot, questions arise as to how the behaviour of the robot is interpreted by local users. We investigated how a robots violations of social norms under shared autonomy influence the local users evaluation of the robots remote users. Specifically, we examined how attribution of such violations to either the robot or the remote user influences social perception of the remote user. Using personal space invasion as a salient social norm violation, we conducted a within-subject experiment (n=20) to investigate these questions. Participants saw several people introducing themselves through a telepresence robot, personal space invasion and attribution were manipulated. We found a significant (p=0.007) joint effect of the manipulations on interpersonal attraction. After these first 20 participants our robot broke down, and we had to continue with another robot (n=20). We found a difference between the two robots, causing us to discard this data from our main analysis. Subsequent video annotation and comparison of the two robots suggests that accuracy of the followed trajectory modifies attribution. Our results offer insights into the mechanisms of attribution in interactions with a telepresence robot as a mediator.

Snoozle -- A Robotic Pillow That Helps You Go to Sleep: HRI 2017 Student Design Competition

Not getting enough sleep is detrimental to our health and productivity, yet we have difficulty to maintain consistent bedtimes. Technological solutions to this problem mostly focus on detecting sleep patterns and providing feedback on them. We felt there was an opportunity for a perspective that concentrates on ones subjective experience. We propose Snoozle, an actuated pillow that supports consistent bedtimes by inviting users to bed, and improves the sleeping experience by enhancing the feeling of co-presence. In this proposal, we present how the concept of Snoozle developed from structured brainstorms, storyboards and sketches. We discuss the actuated pillow behavior and the envisioned interaction, and we detail our next steps.