Charting Sequential Person Transfers Between Devices, Agents, and Robots

Abstract

In the not-so-distant future, people in service experiences are likely to interact with more than a single intelligent system, often sequentially, including different robots and devices. However, there has been sparse work exploring the characteristics of transferring people from one intelligent system to another. This paper aims to create a context-independent taxonomy to differentiate and categorize the transfer of users across robots, devices, and human staff in service interactions. We conducted two sets of design workshops where participants generated scenarios of human-multi-robot interactions and existing person transfers. Using the outcomes of both workshops, we analyzed scenarios and constructed a taxonomy for person transfers with 4-dimensions: Rationale, Type, Design, and Information Shared. We showcase different ways to utilize the taxonomy, and, through it, we discuss the trade-offs and design considerations in the implementation of person transfers.