On the Influence of Social Robots in Cognitive Multitasking

Abstract

Designing a humanoid robot to assist in performing cognitive multitasking is not straightforward, as the robot’s communication itself could interfere with humans’ concentration on the tasks. Therefore, we focused on the social facilitation effect caused by the presence of social robots. According to our study, a social robot that expressed its willingness to collaborate in a positive manner and provided advice with social signals only in some tasks, improved the human performance even in another task where no direct advice was given. Moreover, the social robot reduced the mental workload measured by the integrated skin conductance response during the multitasking scenario. Our results showed a new approach to improve multitasking performance in a mixed team with humans and social humanoid robots.