Physical constraints on human robot interaction

This paper conducts an experiment to investigate the effect of a physical constraint on a subject's viewpoint when using spoken language to navigate a robot. In addition, a robot navigation environment named Spondia-II has been developed for the experiment with an actual autonomous mobile robot. It is well known that the meaning of an utterance, such as a demonstrative pronoun, depends on the viewpoint of the speaker or the hearer. In a conversation between people, the primary factor in determining viewpoint is the physical constraints that are mediated by their body movements. This paper notes that these physical constraints also have an effect on viewpoint even when people instruct a robot. Furthermore, it is argued that, the utterance process also would greatly improve if the robot were able to comprehend the constraints.