The Need for a Model of Contact and Perception to Support Natural Interactivity in Human-Robot Communication

In studies of human-robot communication we have observed that the robot´s inability to give appropriate communicative feedback for contact and perception causes miscommunication [2]. The purpose of this paper is to motivate the need for and give an initial characterisation of a model for communicative contact and perception feedback. One component of a such a model could be a kind of low-level user model aiming to decide the perceptual status of the user. We have analysed an example of interaction that shows signs of miscommunication that is related to feedback problems concerning contact and perception. Using the analysis to pinpoint the source of these problems we provide an initial account for the type of information sources that a low-level user that handles communicative contact and perception feedback should comprise. We also provide two design examples that in our view motivates this explorative effort.