Tangible Scenography as a Holistic Design Method for Human-Robot Interaction

TL;DR

This paper introduces tangible scenography and a design tool to holistically craft human-robot interactions within complex social environments, encouraging designers to think beyond simple behaviors.

Contribution

It presents a novel holistic design method and a physical tool for creating complex, socially aware human-robot interaction scenarios.

Findings

Designers used tangible scenography to create diverse interaction scenes.

The method encouraged thinking beyond narrow robot capabilities.

Design sessions demonstrated the approach's effectiveness in complex social contexts.

Abstract

Traditional approaches to human-robot interaction design typically examine robot behaviors in controlled environments and narrow tasks. These methods are impractical for designing robots that interact with diverse user groups in complex human environments. Drawing from the field of theater, we present the construct of scenes -- individual environments consisting of specific people, objects, spatial arrangements, and social norms -- and tangible scenography, as a holistic design approach for human-robot interactions. We created a design tool, Tangible Scenography Kit (TaSK), with physical props to aid in design brainstorming. We conducted design sessions with eight professional designers to generate exploratory designs. Designers used tangible scenography and TaSK components to create multiple scenes with specific interaction goals, characterize each scene's social environment, and design scene-specific robot behaviors. From these sessions, we found that this method can encourage designers to think beyond a robot's narrow capabilities and consider how they can facilitate complex social interactions.