How language of interaction affects the user perception of a robot
Barbara Sienkiewicz, Gabriela Sejnova, Paul Gajewski, Michal Vavrecka,, and Bipin Indurkhya

TL;DR
This study investigates how the language of interaction influences user perception of a robot, revealing that users perceive an English-speaking robot as more intelligent than a Czech-speaking one.
Contribution
It provides empirical evidence that language choice affects human perception of robot intelligence in HRI contexts.
Findings
English-speaking robot perceived as more intelligent
Language influences user perception in HRI
Participants' feedback offers insights for robot communication design
Abstract
Spoken language is the most natural way for a human to communicate with a robot. It may seem intuitive that a robot should communicate with users in their native language. However, it is not clear if a user's perception of a robot is affected by the language of interaction. We investigated this question by conducting a study with twenty-three native Czech participants who were also fluent in English. The participants were tasked with instructing the Pepper robot on where to place objects on a shelf. The robot was controlled remotely using the Wizard-of-Oz technique. We collected data through questionnaires, video recordings, and a post-experiment feedback session. The results of our experiment show that people perceive an English-speaking robot as more intelligent than a Czech-speaking robot (z = 18.00, p-value = 0.02). This finding highlights the influence of language on human-robot…
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Taxonomy
TopicsSocial Robot Interaction and HRI · AI in Service Interactions · Robotics and Automated Systems
