May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks
Remote support in general is a method that saves time and resources. A relatively new and promising technology for remote support that combines video conferencing and physical mobility is that of telepresence systems. The remote assistant, that is, the user of said technology, gains both presence an...
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MDPI AG
2025-05-01
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| Series: | Robotics |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2218-6581/14/6/73 |
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| author | Jennifer Brade Sarah Mandl Franziska Klimant Anja Strobel Philipp Klimant Martin Dix |
| author_facet | Jennifer Brade Sarah Mandl Franziska Klimant Anja Strobel Philipp Klimant Martin Dix |
| author_sort | Jennifer Brade |
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| description | Remote support in general is a method that saves time and resources. A relatively new and promising technology for remote support that combines video conferencing and physical mobility is that of telepresence systems. The remote assistant, that is, the user of said technology, gains both presence and maneuverability in the distant location. As telepresence systems vary greatly in their design, the question arises as to whether the design influences the perception of the remote assistant. Unlike pure design studies, the present work focuses not only on the design and evaluation of the telepresence system itself, but especially on its perception during a collaborative task involving a human partner visible through the telepresence system. This paper presents two studies in which participants performed an assembly task under the guidance of a remote assistant. The remote assistant was visible through differently designed telepresence systems that were evaluated in terms of social perception and trustworthiness. Four telepresence systems were evaluated in study 1 (<i>N</i> = 32) and five different systems in study 2 (<i>N</i> = 34). The results indicated that similarly designed systems showed only marginal differences, but a system that was designed to transport additional loads and was therefore less agile and rather bulky was rated significantly less positively regarding competence than the other systems. It is particularly noteworthy that it was not the height of the communication medium that was decisive for the rating, but above all, the agility and mobility of the system. These results provide evidence that the design of a telepresence system can influence the social perception of the remote assistant and therefore has implications for the acceptance and use of telepresence systems. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-6ae0939df04248bebf5ae857b1b8046f |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2218-6581 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-05-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
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| series | Robotics |
| spelling | doaj-art-6ae0939df04248bebf5ae857b1b8046f2025-08-20T03:27:32ZengMDPI AGRobotics2218-65812025-05-011467310.3390/robotics14060073May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly TasksJennifer Brade0Sarah Mandl1Franziska Klimant2Anja Strobel3Philipp Klimant4Martin Dix5Professorship Production Systems and Processes, Chemnitz University of Technology, Reichenhainer Str. 70, 09126 Chemnitz, GermanyProfessorship Personality Psychology and Assessment, Chemnitz University of Technology, Wilhelm-Raabe-Straße 43, 09120 Chemnitz, GermanyProfessorship Production Systems and Processes, Chemnitz University of Technology, Reichenhainer Str. 70, 09126 Chemnitz, GermanyProfessorship Personality Psychology and Assessment, Chemnitz University of Technology, Wilhelm-Raabe-Straße 43, 09120 Chemnitz, GermanyProfessorship Virtual Technologies, Hochschule Mittweida—University of Applied Sciences, Technikumplatz 17, 09648 Mittweida, GermanyProfessorship Production Systems and Processes, Chemnitz University of Technology, Reichenhainer Str. 70, 09126 Chemnitz, GermanyRemote support in general is a method that saves time and resources. A relatively new and promising technology for remote support that combines video conferencing and physical mobility is that of telepresence systems. The remote assistant, that is, the user of said technology, gains both presence and maneuverability in the distant location. As telepresence systems vary greatly in their design, the question arises as to whether the design influences the perception of the remote assistant. Unlike pure design studies, the present work focuses not only on the design and evaluation of the telepresence system itself, but especially on its perception during a collaborative task involving a human partner visible through the telepresence system. This paper presents two studies in which participants performed an assembly task under the guidance of a remote assistant. The remote assistant was visible through differently designed telepresence systems that were evaluated in terms of social perception and trustworthiness. Four telepresence systems were evaluated in study 1 (<i>N</i> = 32) and five different systems in study 2 (<i>N</i> = 34). The results indicated that similarly designed systems showed only marginal differences, but a system that was designed to transport additional loads and was therefore less agile and rather bulky was rated significantly less positively regarding competence than the other systems. It is particularly noteworthy that it was not the height of the communication medium that was decisive for the rating, but above all, the agility and mobility of the system. These results provide evidence that the design of a telepresence system can influence the social perception of the remote assistant and therefore has implications for the acceptance and use of telepresence systems.https://www.mdpi.com/2218-6581/14/6/73telepresence systemassembly tasksocial perceptioncollaborationhuman–robot interaction |
| spellingShingle | Jennifer Brade Sarah Mandl Franziska Klimant Anja Strobel Philipp Klimant Martin Dix May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks Robotics telepresence system assembly task social perception collaboration human–robot interaction |
| title | May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks |
| title_full | May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks |
| title_fullStr | May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks |
| title_full_unstemmed | May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks |
| title_short | May I Assist You?—Exploring the Impact of Telepresence System Design on the Social Perception of Remote Assistants in Collaborative Assembly Tasks |
| title_sort | may i assist you exploring the impact of telepresence system design on the social perception of remote assistants in collaborative assembly tasks |
| topic | telepresence system assembly task social perception collaboration human–robot interaction |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2218-6581/14/6/73 |
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