Communicating Directional Intent in Robot Navigation using Projection Indicators

Abstract

Smooth and efficient robot navigation among humans is a crucial requirement for successful integration of robots in human society. Towards this end, an indispensable characteristic of robot action is legibility while communicating its intention. However, unlike humans, present robots cannot convey its intention through human-like non-verbal communication. This paper explores the use of projection indicators for communicating directional intent of a robot across three different `crossing scenarios' as a means of overcoming the shortcomings of the robot's non-verbal communication abilities. The results of the study show statistically significant improvement in perceived feelings of the measured attributes when using the auxiliary communication method. The studied method also improves cooperation from the participants. Nevertheless, the improvement in perceived feeling does not necessarily replicate in terms of smoothness across all the scenarios.