Learning Socially Appropriate Robo-waiter Behaviours through Real-time User Feedback
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Conference Name
ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction
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McQuillin, E., Churamani, N., & Gunes, H. Learning Socially Appropriate Robo-waiter Behaviours through Real-time User Feedback. ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.80034
Abstract
Current Humanoid Service Robot (HSR) behaviours mainly rely on static models that cannot adapt dynamically to meet individual customer attitudes and preferences. In this work, we focus on empowering HSRs with adaptive feedback mechanisms driven by either implicit reward, by estimating facial
affect, or explicit reward, by incorporating verbal responses of the human ‘customer’. To achieve this, we first create a custom dataset, annotated using crowd-sourced labels, to learn appropriate approach (positioning and movement) behaviours for a Robo-waiter. This dataset is used to pre-train a Reinforcement Learning (RL) agent to learn behaviours deemed socially appropriate for the robo-waiter. This model is later extended to include separate implicit and explicit reward mechanisms to allow for interactive
learning and adaptation from user social feedback. We present a within-subjects Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) study with 21 participants implementing interactions between the robo-waiter and human customers implementing the above-mentioned model variations. Our results show that both explicit and implicit adaptation mechanisms enabled the adaptive robo-waiter to be rated as more enjoyable and sociable, and its positioning relative
to the participants as more appropriate compared to using the pre-trained model or a randomised control implementation.
Keywords
Reinforcement Learning, Humanoid Robo-waiter, Explicit Feedback, Implicit Feedback, Facial Affect
Sponsorship
E. McQuillin was supported by the 2020/21 DeepMind Cambridge
Scholarship. N. Churamani is funded by the EPSRC grant EP/R513180/1
(ref. 2107412). H. Gunes is supported by the EPSRC project ARoEQ under
grant ref. EP/R030782/1.
Funder references
EPSRC (2107412)
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/R030782/1)
Embargo Lift Date
2023-01-10
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.80034
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/332587
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