Developing Autonomous Robot-Mediated Behavior Coaching Sessions with Haru
This work addresses behavior change coaching for individuals through social robotics, but it is incremental as it builds on existing methods like Tiny Habits.
The study tackled the problem of designing autonomous dialogues for behavior change coaching using the Haru robot, resulting in significant improvements in perceptions of Haru's liveliness, interactivity, and neutrality in an experiment with 12 participants.
This study presents an empirical investigation into the design and impact of autonomous dialogues in human-robot interaction for behavior change coaching. We focus on the use of Haru, a tabletop social robot, and explore the implementation of the Tiny Habits method for fostering positive behavior change. The core of our study lies in developing a fully autonomous dialogue system that maximizes Haru's emotional expressiveness and unique personality. Our methodology involved iterative design and extensive testing of the dialogue system, ensuring it effectively embodied the principles of the Tiny Habits method while also incorporating strategies for trust-raising and trust-dampening. The effectiveness of the final version of the dialogue was evaluated in an experimental study with human participants (N=12). The results indicated a significant improvement in perceptions of Haru's liveliness, interactivity, and neutrality. Additionally, our study contributes to the broader understanding of dialogue design in social robotics, offering practical insights for future developments in the field.