Robot-Guided Evacuation as a Paradigm for Human-Robot Interaction Research

Abstract

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This paper conceptualizes the problem of emergency evacuation as a paradigm for investigating human-robot interaction. We argue that emergency evacuation offers unique and important perspectives on human-robot interaction while also demanding close attention to the ethical ramifications of the technologies developed. We present a series of approaches for developing emergency evacuation robots and detail several essential design considerations. This paper concludes with a discussion of the ethical implications of emergency evacuation robots and a roadmap for their development, implementation, and evaluation.

Keywords

• evacuation
• human-robot interaction
• robot ethics
• emergency robotics
• human-robot trust