Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Talk to Me: Verbal Communication Improves Perceptions of Friendship and Social Presence in Human-Robot Interaction

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVA 2016)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 10011))

Included in the following conference series:

Abstract

The ability of social agents, be it virtually-embodied avatars or physically-embodied robots, to display social behavior and interact with their users in a natural way represents an important factor in how effective such agents are during interactions. In particular, endowing the agent with effective communicative abilities, well-suited for the target application or task, can make a significant difference in how users perceive the agent, especially when the agent needs to interact in complex social environments. In this work, we consider how two core input communication modalities present in human-robot interaction—speech recognition and touch-based selection—shape users’ perceptions of the agent. We design a short interaction in order to gauge adolescents’ reaction to the input communication modality employed by a robot intended as a long-term companion for motivating them to engage in daily physical activity. A study with n = 52 participants shows that adolescents perceive the robot as more of a friend and more socially present in the speech recognition condition than in the touch-based selection one. Our results highlight the advantages of using speech recognition as an input communication modality even when this represents the less robust choice, and the importance of investigating how to best do so.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Details omitted for double-blind reviewing

    Google Scholar 

  2. Physical activity guidelines for americans midcourse report: strategies to increase physical activity among youth. Technical report, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Adalgeirsson, S.O., Breazeal, C.: Mebot: a robotic platform for socially embodied presence. In: Proceedings of the 5th ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-robot Interaction, pp. 15–22. IEEE Press (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Barker, J., Marxer, R., Vincent, E., Watanabe, S.: The thirdchime’speech separation and recognition challenge: dataset, task and baselines. In: 2015 IEEE Automatic Speech Recognition and Understanding Workshop (ASRU 2015) (2015)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Baxter, P., Wood, R., Belpaeme, T.: A touchscreen-based ‘sandtray’ to facilitate, mediate and contextualise human-robot social interaction. In: Proceedings of the Seventh Annual ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, HRI 2012, pp. 105–106. ACM, New York (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Boreham, C., Riddoch, C.: The physical activity, fitness and health of children. J. Sports Sci. 19(12), 915–929 (2001)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Ericsson: Ericsson mobility report, February 2016

    Google Scholar 

  8. Gerosa, M., et al.: A review of asr technologies for children’s speech. In: Proceedings of the 2nd Workshop on Child, Computer and Interaction. ACM (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  9. Gorostiza, J.F., et al.: Multimodal human-robot interaction framework for a personal robot. In: The 15th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, ROMAN 2006, pp. 39–44. IEEE (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Harms, C., Biocca, F.: Internal consistency and reliability of the networked minds measure of social presence (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  11. Heerink, M., et al.: Enjoyment intention to use and actual use of a conversational robot by elderly people. In: Proceedings of the 3rd ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human Robot Interaction, pp. 113–120. ACM, New York (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Android Inc., speech (2014). http://developer.android.com/reference/android/speech/package-summary.html

  13. Kozima, H., Michalowski, M.P., Nakagawa, C.: Keepon. Int. J. Social Robot. 1(1), 3–18 (2009)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Kudryavstev, A.: Automatic speech recognition services comparison (2016). http://blog.griddynamics.com/2016/01/automatic-speech-recognition-services.html

  15. Leite, I., Mascarenhas, S., Pereira, A., Martinho, C., Prada, R., Paiva, A.: “Why can’t we be friends?” An empathic game companion for long-term interaction. In: Allbeck, J., Badler, N., Bickmore, T., Pelachaud, C., Safonova, A. (eds.) IVA 2010. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 6356, pp. 315–321. Springer, Heidelberg (2010). doi:10.1007/978-3-642-15892-6_32

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  16. Marcus, B.H., Forsyth, L.: Motivating People to be Physically Active. Human Kinetics, Champaign (2003)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Mendelson, M., Aboud, F.: McGill friendship questionnairerespondents affection (MFQ-RA). Measurement Instrument Database for the Social Science (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Oudeyer, P.Y., Rouanet, P., Filliat, D.: An integrated system for teaching new visually grounded words to a robot for non-expert users using a mobile device. In: IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots, Tsukuba, Japan (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Pereira, A., Prada, R., Paiva, A.: Socially present board game opponents. In: Nijholt, A., Romão, T., Reidsma, D. (eds.) ACE 2012. LNCS, vol. 7624, pp. 101–116. Springer, Heidelberg (2012). doi:10.1007/978-3-642-34292-9_8

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  20. Perzanowski, D., Schultz, A.C., Adams, W., Marsh, E., Bugajska, M.: Building a multimodal human-robot interface. IEEE Intell. Syst. 16(1), 16–21 (2001)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Qiu, L., Benbasat, I.: An investigation into the effects of text-to-speech voice and 3D avatars on the perception of presence and flow of live help in electronic commerce. ACM Trans. Comput.-Hum. Interact. (TOCHI) 12(4), 329–355 (2005)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Qiu, L., Benbasat, I.: Online consumer trust and live help interfaces: the effects of text-to-speech voice and three-dimensional avatars. Int. J. Hum.-Comput. Interact. 19(1), 75–94 (2005)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Roe, D.B., Wilpon, J.G., et al.: Voice Communication Between Humans and Machines. National Academies Press, Washington, DC (1994)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Rybski, P.E., et al.: Interactive robot task training through dialog and demonstration. In: Proceedings of the ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-robot Interaction, pp. 49–56. ACM, New York (2007)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Short, E., et al.: How to train your dragonbot: socially assistive robots for teaching children about nutrition through play. In: The 23rd International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, pp. 924–929. IEEE (2014)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Short, J., Williams, E., Christie, B.: The Social Psychology of Telecommunications. Wiley, London (1976)

    Google Scholar 

  27. Skalski, P., Tamborini, R.: The role of social presence in interactive agent-based persuasion. Media Psychol. 10(3), 385–413 (2007)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Slater, M.: Place illusion and plausibility can lead to realistic behaviour in immersive virtual environments. Philos. Trans. Royal Soc. Lond. B Biol. Sci. 364(1535), 3549–3557 (2009)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Tickle-Degnen, L., Rosenthal, R.: The nature of rapport and its nonverbal correlates. Psychol. Inq. 1(4), 285–293 (1990)

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Yale University, 51 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT, 06511, USA

    Elena Corina Grigore, Andre Pereira, Ian Zhou & Brian Scassellati

  2. Amity Regional High School, Woodbridge, CT, 06525, USA

    David Wang

Authors
  1. Elena Corina Grigore
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Andre Pereira
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Ian Zhou
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. David Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Brian Scassellati
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Elena Corina Grigore .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA

    David Traum

  2. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA

    William Swartout

  3. US Army Research Laboratory, Los Angeles, California, USA

    Peter Khooshabeh

  4. Universität Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

    Stefan Kopp

  5. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA

    Stefan Scherer

  6. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA

    Anton Leuski

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2016 Springer International Publishing AG

About this paper

Cite this paper

Grigore, E.C., Pereira, A., Zhou, I., Wang, D., Scassellati, B. (2016). Talk to Me: Verbal Communication Improves Perceptions of Friendship and Social Presence in Human-Robot Interaction. In: Traum, D., Swartout, W., Khooshabeh, P., Kopp, S., Scherer, S., Leuski, A. (eds) Intelligent Virtual Agents. IVA 2016. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 10011. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47665-0_5

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47665-0_5

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47664-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47665-0

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation