The Robot Eyes Don't Have It.The Presence of Eye Gaze on Collaborative Robots Yields Marginally Higher Human Trust But Lower Performance

26 Pages Posted: 27 Jan 2023

See all articles by Artur Pilacinski

Artur Pilacinski

Ruhr-University Bochum

Ana Pinto

Universidade de Coimbra

Soraia Oliveira

Universidade de Coimbra

Eduardo Araujo

Universidade de Coimbra

Carla Carvalho

Universidade de Coimbra

Paula Alexandra Silva

Universidade de Coimbra

Ricardo Matias

Universidade de Coimbra

Paulo Menezes

Universidade de Coimbra

Sonia Sousa

Tallinn University (TLU)

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Abstract

Eye gaze is a prominent feature of human social lives but little is known whether fitting eyes on machines makes humans trust them more. In this study we compared subjective and objective markers of human trust when collaborating with eyed and non-eyed robots of the same type. We used virtual reality scenes in which we manipulated distance and the presence of eyes on a robot’s display during simple collaboration scenes. We found that while collaboration with eyed cobots resulted in slightly higher subjective trust ratings, subjects’ objective markers like pupil size and task completion time indicated that collaborating with eyed robots is actually less comfortable. These findings fall in line with recent suggestions that anthropomorphism may be actually a detrimental feature of collaborative robots. They also show the complex relationship between human objective and subjective markers of trust when collaborating with artificial agents.

Keywords: collaborative robotics, anthropomorphism, human-robot collaboration, eye gaze

Suggested Citation

Pilacinski, Artur and Pinto, Ana and Oliveira, Soraia and Araujo, Eduardo and Carvalho, Carla and Silva, Paula Alexandra and Matias, Ricardo and Menezes, Paulo and Sousa, Sonia, The Robot Eyes Don't Have It.The Presence of Eye Gaze on Collaborative Robots Yields Marginally Higher Human Trust But Lower Performance. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4339644 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4339644

Artur Pilacinski (Contact Author)

Ruhr-University Bochum ( email )

Ana Pinto

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Soraia Oliveira

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Eduardo Araujo

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Carla Carvalho

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Paula Alexandra Silva

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Ricardo Matias

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Paulo Menezes

Universidade de Coimbra ( email )

Coimbra
Coimbra, Coimbra 3000-206
Portugal

Sonia Sousa

Tallinn University (TLU) ( email )

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