Towards Enhancing Human-robot Communication for Industrial Robots: A Study in Facial Expressions Mot Förbättra Människa-robot Kommunikation för Industrirobotar : En studie i ansiktsuttryck

Collaborative robots are becoming more commonplace within factories to work alongside their human counterparts. With this newfound perspective towards robots being seen as collaborative partners comes the question of how interacting with these machines will change. This thesis therefore focuses on investigating the connection between facial expression communication in industrial robots and users' perceptions. Experiments were conducted to investigate the relationship between users' perceptions towards both existing facial expressions of the Baxter robot (an industrial robot by Rethink Robotics) and redesigned versions of these facial expressions. Findings reveal that the redesigned facial expressions provide a better match to users’ expectations. In addition, insights into improving the expressive communication between humans and robots are discussed, including the need for additional solutions which can complement the facial expressions displayed by providing more detailed information as needed. The last section of this thesis presents future research directions towards building a more intuitive and user-friendly human-robot cooperation space for future industrial robots