Designing effective strategies for human-robot collaboration

Abstract

Industries are increasingly encouraging human-robot collaboration to complete tasks. As robots become more ubiquitous in these environments, robots will need an appropriate understanding of the social behaviors necessary to work alongside humans. The goal of my dissertation is to inspect how key behaviors for effective collaboration-particularly communication strategies, gestures, and object management-affect task outcomes. An understanding of these behaviors will inform designs of collaborative robot behavior and reveal a deeper understanding of human behavior. My work first understands a set of human behaviors, translates those behaviors to a robot, and tests the impact of each behavior on collaborative outcomes.