What Does a Meow Mean? In Search of Intuitively Understandable Communication by a Nonverbal Companion Robot

TL;DR

This study develops and evaluates nonverbal communication signals for a companion robot aimed at assisting older adults, finding that combined visual and auditory cues improve interpretability, especially with strong sentiments.

Contribution

The paper introduces a set of nonverbal signals for a companion robot and evaluates their effectiveness in conveying intentions to older adults.

Findings

Combined visual and auditory signals lead to high accuracy in understanding robot intentions.

Absence of visual signals decreases accuracy, while absence of auditory signals can sometimes increase it.

Auditory signals are most helpful when conveying strong sentiments like purring.

Abstract

Older adults living alone have a number of challenges, and robots can help with some of them--by providing reminders, initiating activity, or offering comfort. As part of developing a cat robot with limited assistive functions, we designed a set of nonverbal communication signals, both auditory (cat sounds) and visual (icons on a small display). To evaluate these signals we used a mixed-methods, user-centered approach. After a pilot study, a focus group with older adults suggested revisions to the initial signal set. A large-sample online experiment then tested whether adults over the age of 65 could accurately infer the robot's communicative intentions. When both visual and auditory signals were present, accuracy was high. When visual signals were absent, accuracy often decreased; when auditory signals were absent, accuracy sometimes increased. So the auditory signals were less helpful, except when the robot conveyed strong sentiments (e.g., purring while being petted).