Behavioral patterns in robotic collaborative assembly: comparing neurotypical and Autism Spectrum Disorder participants

Marta Mondellini; Pooja Prajod; Matteo Lavit Nicora; Mattia Chiappini; Ettore Micheletti; Fabio Alexander Storm; Rocco Vertechy; Elisabeth André; Matteo Malosio

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1245857

Behavioral patterns in robotic collaborative assembly: comparing neurotypical and Autism Spectrum Disorder participants

Front Psychol. 2023 Oct 26:14:1245857. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1245857. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Marta Mondellini^#^{1

2}, Pooja Prajod^#³, Matteo Lavit Nicora^#^{1

4}, Mattia Chiappini⁵, Ettore Micheletti⁵, Fabio Alexander Storm⁵, Rocco Vertechy⁴, Elisabeth André³, Matteo Malosio¹

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Intelligent Industrial Technologies and Systems for Advanced Manufacturing, National Research Council of Italy, Lecco, Italy.
² Department of Psychology, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Milan, Italy.
³ Department of Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, University of Augsburg, Augsburg, Germany.
⁴ Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
⁵ Scientific Institute, Istituto di Ricovero e Cura a Carattere Scientifico E. Medea, Lecco, Italy.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Introduction: In Industry 4.0, collaborative tasks often involve operators working with collaborative robots (cobots) in shared workspaces. Many aspects of the operator's well-being within this environment still need in-depth research. Moreover, these aspects are expected to differ between neurotypical (NT) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) operators.

Methods: This study examines behavioral patterns in 16 participants (eight neurotypical, eight with high-functioning ASD) during an assembly task in an industry-like lab-based robotic collaborative cell, enabling the detection of potential risks to their well-being during industrial human-robot collaboration. Each participant worked on the task for five consecutive days, 3.5 h per day. During these sessions, six video clips of 10 min each were recorded for each participant. The videos were used to extract quantitative behavioral data using the NOVA annotation tool and analyzed qualitatively using an ad-hoc observational grid. Also, during the work sessions, the researchers took unstructured notes of the observed behaviors that were analyzed qualitatively.

Results: The two groups differ mainly regarding behavior (e.g., prioritizing the robot partner, gaze patterns, facial expressions, multi-tasking, and personal space), adaptation to the task over time, and the resulting overall performance.

Discussion: This result confirms that NT and ASD participants in a collaborative shared workspace have different needs and that the working experience should be tailored depending on the end-user's characteristics. The findings of this study represent a starting point for further efforts to promote well-being in the workplace. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work comparing NT and ASD participants in a collaborative industrial scenario.

Keywords: Autism Spectrum Disorder; Industry 4.0; behavior analysis; human-robot collaboration; joint activity; wellbeing.

Grants and funding

This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 847926 MindBot.