Evaluating Telepresence Robots in the Field - Agents and Artificial Intelligence - page 440

considered as mandatory steps for both a general roadmap in robotics and our specific
work.
As a first contribution, we have highlighted the importance of performing ecological
experiments , i.e., which reproduce as much as possible the actual conditions of use of
robotic technology, in terms for instance of real people who use it and real context of
use. Although still simple in the results, analysis of the short-term evaluation provides
a number of indications “from the field” that are representative of the actual users'
expectations, both in relation to the human-robot interaction and to the most urgent
technological improvements essential for an effective deployment. For example, health
workers expressed a number of requests that would be important to fruitfully use the
G IRAFF system as a means to support their work. At the same time, the technological
tests done in real homes, highlighted technological barriers that must be necessarily
overcome.
The article's second contribution concerns our effort toward a long-term assessment.
Other works in the area have highlighted this need but in this article we have proposed a
rather elaborated and detailed methodology for the long-term evaluation that is currently
being applied to real test sites of elderly people for long periods of time.
In addressing these two points, there were also a number of technological challenges
and requirements for “intelligent features” that the technology should incorporate and
that could contribute to solve some of the open challenges in moving from a short-term
demonstration to a real and continuous use.
Acknowledgements. Authors are partially supported by the EU under the Ambient
Assisted Living Joint Program - E X CITE Project (AAL-2009-2-125) - and under the
ICT Call 7 - GiraffPlus Project (GA 288173). Authors are indebted to project partners
for the stimulating work environment. Interactions with the colleagues from Orebro
University have been fruitful to synthesize the evaluation plan. Authors would like to
thank Vittoria Giuliani for comments to preliminary versions of this work.
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