Embodiment of Interaction Design for a Compliant Social Robot

In this paper, the interactions and expressions design of the new social robot is presented. It is developed based on its compliant physical appearance, which will promote physical interactions between humans and robots. The perception information was aggregated from IMUs, optical range sensors, and flexible tactile sensor units. The tactile sensor units are fabricated from cotton fabric sheets, piezoresistive polymeric foil, and stainless-steel conductive threads. The robot’s expressions were generated by combining the head movement of the robot with its compliant ears motion and the animated image on its LCD face. The robot’s upper ears are a compliant mechanism fabricated using TPU. The robot’s lower ears were actuated by a continuum mechanism. The evaluation of the proposed interaction design is done by an online survey of 130 participants.