Virtual Reality, a tool for safe testing of user experience in collaborative robotics

Collaborative robots (cobots) could help humans in tasks that are mundane, dangerous or where human contact carries risk, as it has been recently uncovered by the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, the collaboration between humans and robots is severely limited by the aspects of safety and comfort of human operators. In this paper, we propose the use of virtual reality (VR) as a way to test collaboration with robots in situations that are difficult or even impossible to safely test in real life, such as those where it would be dangerous to perform testing. Using VR as a means to evaluate collaboration with robots would allow collecting human behavioral data, subjective self-reports, and biosignals signifying human comfort, stress and cognitive load during collaboration. The use of VR allows direct porting of results to real robotic control systems. This approach can revolutionize the way we design, train and test cobots, and open up a range of new design applications: from industry, through healthcare to space operations. The naturalistic collaborative and assistive robots will be also useful when human motor control is impaired, whether by disease (like cerebral palsy or paralysis) or damage (like amputation) or for the older adult population.

Content

Author and article information

Contributors

Diogo Branco

Paula Alexandra Silva

Jorge Almeida

Paulo Menezes

Sergi Bermudez I Badia

Artur Pilacinski

Conference

Publication date (Print): July 2021

Pages: 1-6

Affiliations

[0001]M-ITI | NOVA LINCS, Univ. Madeira

Funchal, Portugal

[0002]DEI | CISUC, Univ. Coimbra

Coimbra, Portugal

[0003]Proaction Lab | CINEICC, Univ. Coimbra

Coimbra, Portugal

[0004]ISR | DEEC, Univ. Coimbra

Coimbra, Portugal

Article

DOI: 10.14236/ewic/HCI2021-W2.4

SO-VID: a4926dda-b8e6-4496-828e-2b8421ed386e

License:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Conference name: 34th British HCI Workshop and Doctoral Consortium

Conference acronym: HCI2021-WDC

Conference number: 34

Conference location: London, UK

Conference date: 20th - 21st July 2021

Conference sponsor: Electronic Workshops in Computing (eWiC)

Conference theme: Post-pandemic HCI – Living Digitally

History

Product

1477-9358 BCS Learning & Development

Self URI (article page): https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/HCI2021-W2.4

Self URI (journal page): https://ewic.bcs.org/

REFERENCES

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W BauerM BenderM BraunP RallyO Scholtz 2016 Lightweight robots in manual assembly—best to start simply Examining companies initial experiences with lightweight robots Stuttgart 1 32
M.M BradleyM CodispotiB.N CuthbertP.J Lang 2001 Emotion and motivation I: defensive and appetitive reactions in picture processing Emotion 1 3 276
S.-J BlakemoreJ Decety 2001 From the perception of action to the understanding of intention Nature reviews neuroscience 2 8 561 567
A CruzG PiresU.J Nunes 2017 Double ErrP detection for automatic error correction in an ERP-based BCI speller IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering 26 1 26 36
P Dockrill 2015 Volkswagen Worker Grabbed And Killed by Robot in German Plant. ScienceAlert Available from: https://www.sciencealert.com/volkswagen-worker-grabbed-and-killed-by-robot-in-german-plant 8 June 2021
D. L EavesM RiachP. S HolmesD. J Wright 2016 Motor imagery during action observation: a brief review of evidence, theory and future research opportunities Frontiers in neuroscience 10 514
IFR Position Paper 2018 Demystifying Collaborative Industrial Robots Frankfurt, Germany International Federation of Robotics
T FlashE Henis 1991 Arm trajectory modifications during reaching towards visual targets Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 3 3 220 230
M GromeierD KoesterT Schack 2017 Gender differences in motor skills of the overarm throw Frontiers in psychology 8 212
R. S JohanssonG WestlingA BäckströmJ. R Flanagan 2001 Eye-hand coordination in object manipulation The Journal of Neuroscience 21 17 6917 6932
P. H Kahn JrH IshiguroB FriedmanT KandaN. G FreierR. L SeversonJ Miller 2007 What is a human?: Toward psychological benchmarks in the field of human–robot interaction Interaction Studies 8 3 363 390
J LazarJ.H FengH Hochheiser 2017 Research methods in human-computer interaction Burlington Morgan Kaufmann
K. F MacDormanR. D GreenC.-C HoC. T Koch 2009 Too real for comfort? uncanny responses to computer generated faces Computers in human behavior 25 3 695 710
J MarkoffC Miller 2014 As Robotics Advances, Worries of Killer Robots Rise New York Times Available from: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/17/upshot/danger-robots-working.html 8 June 2021
A MartinJ Weisberg 2003 Neural foundations for understanding social and mechanical concepts Cognitive Neuropsychology 20 3-6 575 587
P MauriceM. E HuberN HoganD Sternad 2017 Velocity-curvature patterns limit human–robot physical interaction IEEE robotics and automation letters 3 1 249 256
P Moreno-BriseñoR DíazA Campos-RomoJ Fernandez-Ruiz 2010 Sex-related differences in motor learning and performance Behavioral and brain functions 6 1 1 4
T Nomura 2017 Robots and Gender Gender and the Genome 1 1 18 26
Y.H OhD.Y Ju 2020 Age-related differences in fixation pattern on a companion robot Sensors 20 13 3807
F OsiurakY RossettiA Badets 2017 What is an affordance? 40 years later Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews 77 403 417
A PilacinskiM WallscheidA Lindner 2018 Human posterior parietal and dorsal premotor cortex encode the visual properties of an upcoming action PLoS ONE 13 10 e0198051
A PilacinskiA Lindner 2019 Distinct contributions of human posterior parietal and dorsal premotor cortex to reach trajectory planning Scientific reports 9 1 1 16
A PilacinskiS De HaanR DonatoJ Almeida 2021 Tool heads prime saccades Scientific reports 11 1 1 8
U Robots 2021 Connecting an Emergency Stop Device vs. a Safeguard Protective Device Universal-robots.com. Available from:https://www.universal-robots.com/articles/ur/application-installation/connecting-an-emergency-stop-device-vs-a-safeguard-protective-device/ 8 June 2021
M SpülerC Niethammer 2015 Error-related potentials during continuous feed-back: using eeg to detect errors of different type and severity Frontiers in human neuroscience 9 155
S. A SteckenfingerA. A Ghazanfar 2009 Monkey visual behavior falls into the uncanny valley Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 106 43 18362 18366
C Towers-Clark 2019 Keep The Robot In The Cage—How Effective (And Safe) Are CoBots? Forbes. Available from: https://www.forbes.com/sites/charlestowersclark/2019/09/11/keep-the-robot-in-the-cagehow-effective--safe-are-co-bots/ 8 June 2021
V WeistrofferA PaljicL CallebertP Fuchs 2013 A methodology to assess the acceptability of human-robot collaboration using virtual reality In Proceedings of the 19th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology Singapore 6-9 October 2013 New York: ACM Press 39 48
K Zuberbühler 2008 Gaze following Current Biology 18 11 R453 R455

Comments

Comment on this article

[1] M AbelS KuzH. J PatelH PetruckC. M SchlickA PellicanoF. C Binkofski 2020 Gender Effects in Observation of Robotic and Humanoid Actions Frontiers in Psychology 11 797

[2] W BauerM BenderM BraunP RallyO Scholtz 2016 Lightweight robots in manual assembly—best to start simply Examining companies initial experiences with lightweight robots Stuttgart 1 32

[3] M.M BradleyM CodispotiB.N CuthbertP.J Lang 2001 Emotion and motivation I: defensive and appetitive reactions in picture processing Emotion 1 3 276

[4] S.-J BlakemoreJ Decety 2001 From the perception of action to the understanding of intention Nature reviews neuroscience 2 8 561 567

[5] A CruzG PiresU.J Nunes 2017 Double ErrP detection for automatic error correction in an ERP-based BCI speller IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering 26 1 26 36

[6] P Dockrill 2015 Volkswagen Worker Grabbed And Killed by Robot in German Plant. ScienceAlert Available from: https://www.sciencealert.com/volkswagen-worker-grabbed-and-killed-by-robot-in-german-plant 8 June 2021

[7] D. L EavesM RiachP. S HolmesD. J Wright 2016 Motor imagery during action observation: a brief review of evidence, theory and future research opportunities Frontiers in neuroscience 10 514

[8] IFR Position Paper 2018 Demystifying Collaborative Industrial Robots Frankfurt, Germany International Federation of Robotics

[9] T FlashE Henis 1991 Arm trajectory modifications during reaching towards visual targets Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 3 3 220 230

[10] M GromeierD KoesterT Schack 2017 Gender differences in motor skills of the overarm throw Frontiers in psychology 8 212

[11] R. S JohanssonG WestlingA BäckströmJ. R Flanagan 2001 Eye-hand coordination in object manipulation The Journal of Neuroscience 21 17 6917 6932

[12] P. H Kahn JrH IshiguroB FriedmanT KandaN. G FreierR. L SeversonJ Miller 2007 What is a human?: Toward psychological benchmarks in the field of human–robot interaction Interaction Studies 8 3 363 390

[13] J LazarJ.H FengH Hochheiser 2017 Research methods in human-computer interaction Burlington Morgan Kaufmann

[14] K. F MacDormanR. D GreenC.-C HoC. T Koch 2009 Too real for comfort? uncanny responses to computer generated faces Computers in human behavior 25 3 695 710

[15] J MarkoffC Miller 2014 As Robotics Advances, Worries of Killer Robots Rise New York Times Available from: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/17/upshot/danger-robots-working.html 8 June 2021

[16] A MartinJ Weisberg 2003 Neural foundations for understanding social and mechanical concepts Cognitive Neuropsychology 20 3-6 575 587

[17] P MauriceM. E HuberN HoganD Sternad 2017 Velocity-curvature patterns limit human–robot physical interaction IEEE robotics and automation letters 3 1 249 256

[18] P Moreno-BriseñoR DíazA Campos-RomoJ Fernandez-Ruiz 2010 Sex-related differences in motor learning and performance Behavioral and brain functions 6 1 1 4

[19] T Nomura 2017 Robots and Gender Gender and the Genome 1 1 18 26

[20] Y.H OhD.Y Ju 2020 Age-related differences in fixation pattern on a companion robot Sensors 20 13 3807

[21] F OsiurakY RossettiA Badets 2017 What is an affordance? 40 years later Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews 77 403 417

[22] A PilacinskiM WallscheidA Lindner 2018 Human posterior parietal and dorsal premotor cortex encode the visual properties of an upcoming action PLoS ONE 13 10 e0198051

[23] A PilacinskiA Lindner 2019 Distinct contributions of human posterior parietal and dorsal premotor cortex to reach trajectory planning Scientific reports 9 1 1 16

[24] A PilacinskiS De HaanR DonatoJ Almeida 2021 Tool heads prime saccades Scientific reports 11 1 1 8

[25] U Robots 2021 Connecting an Emergency Stop Device vs. a Safeguard Protective Device Universal-robots.com. Available from:https://www.universal-robots.com/articles/ur/application-installation/connecting-an-emergency-stop-device-vs-a-safeguard-protective-device/ 8 June 2021

[26] M SpülerC Niethammer 2015 Error-related potentials during continuous feed-back: using eeg to detect errors of different type and severity Frontiers in human neuroscience 9 155

[27] S. A SteckenfingerA. A Ghazanfar 2009 Monkey visual behavior falls into the uncanny valley Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 106 43 18362 18366

[28] C Towers-Clark 2019 Keep The Robot In The Cage—How Effective (And Safe) Are CoBots? Forbes. Available from: https://www.forbes.com/sites/charlestowersclark/2019/09/11/keep-the-robot-in-the-cagehow-effective--safe-are-co-bots/ 8 June 2021

[29] V WeistrofferA PaljicL CallebertP Fuchs 2013 A methodology to assess the acceptability of human-robot collaboration using virtual reality In Proceedings of the 19th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology Singapore 6-9 October 2013 New York: ACM Press 39 48

[30] K Zuberbühler 2008 Gaze following Current Biology 18 11 R453 R455

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