Soothing Sensations: Enhancing Interactions with a Socially Assistive Robot through Vibrotactile Heartbeats

TL;DR

This study explores how vibrotactile heartbeat stimulation on a socially assistive robot can enhance emotional regulation and perceived social presence, especially during stressful situations, by reinforcing the robot's lifelike qualities.

Contribution

It introduces the novel use of vibrotactile heartbeat feedback to improve human-robot interaction and emotional support in SARs, supported by qualitative insights from user interviews.

Findings

Vibrotactile heartbeat enhances perceived social presence of the robot.

Robot presence helps users redirect attention from stressors.

Vibrotactile feedback increases perceived lifelikeness of the robot.

Abstract

Physical interactions with socially assistive robots (SARs) positively affect user wellbeing. However, haptic experiences when touching a SAR are typically limited to perceiving the robot's movements or shell texture, while other modalities that could enhance the touch experience with the robot, such as vibrotactile stimulation, are under-explored. In this exploratory qualitative study, we investigate the potential of enhancing human interaction with the PARO robot through vibrotactile heartbeats, with the goal to regulate subjective wellbeing during stressful situations. We conducted in-depth one-on-one interviews with 30 participants, who watched three horror movie clips alone, with PARO, and with a PARO that displayed a vibrotactile heartbeat. Our findings show that PARO's presence and its interactive capabilities can help users regulate emotions through attentional redeployment from a stressor toward the robot. The vibrotactile heartbeat further reinforced PARO's physical and social presence, enhancing the socio-emotional support provided by the robot and its perceived life-likeness. We discuss the impact of individual differences in user experience and implications for the future design of life-like vibrotactile stimulation for SARs.