Towards an Evaluation Framework of Safety, Trust, and Operator Experience in Different Demonstrators of Human-Robot Collaboration

Abstract

Advancements in human-robot collaboration (HRC) are regarded as major aspects of the future Industry 4.0. HRC entails humans that cooperatively work with fenceless robots in dynamic, changing, and unpredictable settings where they should assist and learn from each other. Because of the prevailing orientation towards human factors, HRC runs the risk of not considering the modern understandings of user experience (UX). It has been acknowledged that the safety aspect is a necessary but not sufficient condition for achieving acceptance of and trust towards the robot companion. Hence UX aspects are also needed in HRC. This paper addresses several perspectives on human-centered evaluation in HRC, and presents the envisioned evaluation framework of HRC, which focuses on safety, trust and operators' experience when interacting closely with different collaborative robots. The final outcome from this work should, in the long run, function as a roadmap for successful implementation of HRC in industry.