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As intelligent agents transition from controlled to uncontrolled environments, they face challenges that sometimes exceed their operational capabilities. In many scenarios, they rely on assistance from bystanders to overcome those…

Robots in urban environments will inevitably encounter situations beyond their capabilities (e.g., delivery robots unable to press traffic light buttons), necessitating bystander assistance. These spontaneous collaborations possess…

Robots are increasingly being deployed in public spaces. However, the general population rarely has the opportunity to nominate what they would prefer or expect a robot to do in these contexts. Since most people have little or no experience…

In this work, we analyze video data and interviews from a public deployment of two trash barrel robots in a large public space to better understand the sensemaking activities people perform when they encounter robots in public spaces. Based…

The proliferation of robots in public spaces necessitates a deeper understanding of how these robots can interact with those they share the space with. In this paper, we present findings from video analysis of publicly deployed cleaning…

Recently the field of Human-Robot Interaction gained popularity, due to the wide range of possibilities of how robots can support humans during daily tasks. One form of supportive robots are socially assistive robots which are specifically…

As robots become increasingly prevalent in human environments, there will inevitably be times when a robot needs to interrupt a human to initiate an interaction. Our work introduces the first interruptibility-aware mobile robot system, and…

Relying on a large corpus of natural interactions between visitors and a robot in a museum setting, we study a recurrent practice through which humans "worked" to maintain the robot as a competent participant: the description by bystanders,…

Robots are increasingly present in human spaces, such as for conducting deliveries in hospitals, interacting with visitors at museums, and stocking items in warehouses. To ensure the seamless integration of robots into these spaces, a new…

Robots operating alongside humans often encounter unfamiliar environments that make autonomous task completion challenging. Though improving models and increasing dataset size can enhance a robot's performance in unseen environments, data…

Mobile robots are increasingly being deployed in public spaces such as shopping malls, airports, and urban sidewalks. Most of these robots are designed with human-aware motion planning capabilities but are not designed to communicate with…

As collaborative robots enter industrial shop floors, logistics, and manufacturing, rapid and flexible evaluation of human-machine interaction has become more important. The availability of consumer headsets for virtual and augmented…

Delivering groceries or cleaning airports, mobile robots exist in public spaces. While these examples showcase robots that execute tasks, this paper explores mobile robots that encourage posthuman collaboration rather than managing…

The 'intuitive' trust people feel when encountering robots in public spaces is a key determinant of their willingness to cooperate with these robots. We conducted four experiments to study this topic in the context of peacekeeping robots.…

In this paper, a cooperative decision-making is presented, which is suitable for intention-aware automated vehicle functions. With an increasing number of highly automated and autonomous vehicles on public roads, trust is a very important…

Social robots are increasingly introduced into children's lives as educational and social companions, yet little is known about how these products might best be introduced to their environments. The emergence of the "unboxing" phenomenon in…

Sidewalk robots are increasingly common across the globe. Yet, their operation on public paths poses challenges for people with mobility disabilities (PwMD) who face barriers to accessibility, such as insufficient curb cuts. We interviewed…

As robots become increasingly prominent in diverse industrial settings, the desire for an accessible and reliable system has correspondingly increased. Yet, the task of meaningfully assessing the feasibility of introducing a new robotic…

When deploying interactive agents like (social) robots in public spaces they need to be able to interact with a diverse audience, with members each having individual diversity characteristics and prior experiences with interactive systems.…

Autonomy and independent navigation are vital to daily life but remain challenging for individuals with blindness. Robotic systems can enhance mobility and confidence by providing intelligent navigation assistance. However, fully autonomous…