Identifying Personality Dimensions for Engineering Robot Personalities in Significant Quantities with Small User Groups

Abstract

Future service robots mass-produced for practical applications may benefit from having personalities. To engineer robot personalities in significant quantities for practical applications, we need first to identify the personality dimensions on which personality traits can be effectively optimised by minimising the distances between engineering targets and the corresponding robots under construction, since not all personality dimensions are applicable and equally prominent. Whether optimisation is possible on a personality dimension depends on how specific users consider the personalities of a type of robot, especially whether they can provide effective feedback to guide the optimisation of certain traits on a personality dimension. The dimensions may vary from user group to user group since not all people consider a type of trait to be relevant to a type of robot, which our results corroborate. Therefore, we had proposed a test procedure as an engineering tool to identify, with the help of a user group, personality dimensions for engineering robot personalities out of a type of robot knowing its typical usage. It applies to robots that can imitate human behaviour and small user groups with at least eight people. We confirmed its effectiveness in limited-scope tests.