Supervisory Control of Robots Using RoboLeader

Abstract

We investigated the effectiveness of RoboLeader, an intelligent agent that could help the human operator control a team of robots, for enhancing the overall human-robot teaming performance. We compared the operators' target detection performance in the 4-robot and 8-robot conditions. The results showed that the participants detected significantly fewer targets with 8 robots vs. 4 robots. Although there were no significance differences between the RoboLeader and Baseline (no RoboLeader) conditions for target detection, the Roboleader group reduced their mission completion times by approximately 13% compared to Baseline. Those participants with higher spatial ability detected more targets than did those with lower spatial ability. Participants experienced significantly higher workload with 8 robots compared to the 4-robot condition, and those with better attentional control reported lower workload than did those with poorer attentional control.