Re-defining Wearable Robots: A Multidisciplinary Approach Towards a Unified Terminology

Abstract

Effective communication is especially important in the wearable robots (WRs) community since it encloses a great variety of devices with applications in several different fields such as healthcare, medical, industrial and military. In this paper we present a Vocabulary of terms that are relevant for diverse stakeholders in the field of WRs. This Vocabulary has been developed in the context of the European COST action on Wearable Robots for Augmentation, Assistance or Substitution of Human Motor Functions. The aim of this project is to work towards the creation of a common understanding of terms and concepts among fields of expertise involved in this field. The ultimate goal is to develop a shared documentation that could serve as a reference to facilitate the use of accepted definitions in the field. The presented vocabulary was first created by including definitions discussed in different working groups composed of several experts in the field. The resulting document was then validated by presenting the definitions to the WR community through an online survey. The survey underlined the usefulness of such a tool to prevent misunderstanding when using terminology and facilitate the inclusion of terms in the documentation. The results of the survey highlight a strong agreement in terms of acceptance of the vocabulary, its usefulness, and applicability of the proposed definitions as well as an overall appreciation for its purpose and target. This work represents a pilot study providing unique material for the WR community encouraging the use of shared agreed definitions.

Towards a validated glossary of usability attributes for the evaluation of wearable robotic devices

“…It is interesting to highlight that most UA with moderate or high-to-moderate agreement ratings are terms usually found within the field of engineering, e.g. autonomy , complexity , robustness , technical requirements and wearability [ 11 ]. We hypothesize that most developers possess an engineering background, which may lead them to interpret these terms in alignment with engineering-based definitions.…”

“…Therefore, their selection of terms for what is considered usability was arbitrary, and some of the proposed definitions are not specifically related to usability. The RUG comprises all the UA included in previous efforts and provides definitions specifically related to usability, including the four UA included in the COST action dictionary and the factors and subfactors in the EXPERIENCE questionnaire from Eurobench [ 11 , 12 ]. The detailed comparison between these previous works in the field and the attributes of our glossary that encompass their definitions are presented in Additional file 3 : Annex 3.…”

“…In this regard, open-source benchmarks for the evaluation of WRD have been developed recently in two coordinated European efforts: Eurobench [ 10 ] and the European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) action for Wearable Robotics [ 11 ]. Eurobench aimed to create a framework for applying benchmarking methodology on bipedal robotic systems, including lower limb WRD and robotic humanoids.…”

“…Nevertheless, their vocabulary is not specific to usability or user experience. As such, the term usability itself was not included, but the UA cognitive load , mental fatigue , robustness , and wearability were separately considered [ 11 ]. This further highlights the need for a more comprehensive, usability-focused framework to define and evaluate the usability of WRD at any TRL.…”