
Alessandra RossiUniversity of Naples Federico II | UNINA
Alessandra Rossi
PhD in Robotics
Assistant Professor at the University of Naples Federico II
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Publications (72)
Autonomous robots are being used in human-centred environments, such as offices, restaurants, hospitals and private homes, for carrying out collaborative and cooperative tasks. These activities require that robots engage people in socially acceptable ways, even when they make errors. It is very common that robots make communication failures due to...
People's successful coexistence with robots strictly depends on people's acceptance of robots' presence in their daily activities. This is particularly relevant when the robot's actions may interfere with or intrude on people's activities, creating discomfort and possible rejection. We believe that people's acceptance of a robot may vary depending...
In this work, we explore the dynamics of trust and deception in human-robot interaction (HRI). Trust is crucial for successful interactions between humans and robots, especially when users are required to rely on robotic systems for assistive tasks. While often viewed negatively, certain forms of deception, such as prosocial deception which could t...
As robots become increasingly integrated into our daily lives, the need to make them transparent has never been more critical. Yet, despite its importance in human-robot interaction, a standardized measure of robot transparency has been missing until now. This paper addresses this gap by presenting the first comprehensive scale to measure perceived...
The evaluation of groups’ dynamics and engagement levels in Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) is crucial for enabling a robot to adapt its behavior and achieve sustained interaction. To address these tasks, various methods have been explored, but these aspects are often treated in isolation. In this work, we present a unified machine-learning approach...
Robotics researchers have been focusing on developing autonomous and human-like intelligent robots that are able to plan, navigate, manipulate objects, and interact with humans in both static and dynamic environments. These capabilities, however, are usually developed for direct interactions with people in controlled environments, and evaluated pri...
On reviewing the literature regarding acceptance and trust in human-robot interaction (HRI), there are a number of open questions that needed to be addressed in order to establish effective collaborations between humans and robots in real-world applications. In particular, we identified four principal open areas that should be investigated to creat...
The BRILLO (Bartending Robot for Interactive Long-Lasting Operations) project aims to create an autonomous robotic bartender that can interact with customers while accomplishing its bartending tasks. In such a scenario, people's novelty effect connected to the use of an attractive technology is destined to wear off and, consequently, negatively aff...
The absence of transparency in robot processes presents a substantial obstacle to facilitating effective human-robot collaboration, particularly in response to the escalating need for autonomous human-robot interaction. This challenge assumes greater significance in non-industrial contexts, as it hinders humans from understanding a robot's intentio...
This paper presents an exploration of the role of explanations provided by robots in enhancing transparency during human-robot interaction (HRI). We conducted a study with 85 participants to investigate the impact of different types and timings of explanations on transparency. In particular, we tested different conditions: (1) no explanations, (2)...
In this work, we introduce the Evaluating tRust weaRing Off in Robots (ERROR) project. This ERROR project aims to address the lack of users' trust in robots, starting from the need for more persuading and personalized robotic mechanisms that can favour people's behavioural changes and compliance with instructions in order to improve their health, s...
In this paper, we present a two parts study where we investigate whether socially relevant interactions depend on a bartender robot’s ability to maintain engaged interactions with two users at a time, by alternating its attention between the two customers, and by capturing their attention by personalising the discussion topics to the users’ prefere...
In human-robot interaction, addressing disparities in action perception is vital for fostering effective collaboration. Our study delves into the integration of explanatory mechanisms during robotic actions, focusing on aligning robot perspectives with the human’s knowledge and beliefs. A comprehensive study involving 143 participants showed that p...
This paper presents an exploration of the role of explanations provided by robots in enhancing transparency during human-robot interaction (HRI). We conducted a study with 85 participants to investigate the impact of different types and timings of explanations on transparency. In particular, we tested different conditions: (1) no explanations, (2)...
People's acceptance and trust in robots are a direct consequence of people's ability to infer and predict the robot's behavior. However, there is no clear consensus on how the legibility of a robot's behavior and explanations should be assessed. In this work, the construct of the Theory of Mind (i.e., the ability to attribute mental states to other...
p>People's social acceptance and trust in robots are a direct consequence of people's ability to infer and predict the robot's behaviour. However, there is no clear consensus on how the legibility of a robot's behaviour and explanations should be assessed. In this work, the construct of Theory of Mind (i.e., the ability to attribute mental states t...
p>People's social acceptance and trust in robots are a direct consequence of people's ability to infer and predict the robot's behaviour. However, there is no clear consensus on how the legibility of a robot's behaviour and explanations should be assessed. In this work, the construct of Theory of Mind (i.e., the ability to attribute mental states t...
Emotions are an effective communication mode during human–human and human–robot interactions. However, while humans can easily understand other people’s emotions, and they are able to show emotions with natural facial expressions, robot-simulated emotions still represent an open challenge also due to a lack of naturalness and variety of possible ex...
This work presents a model for improving transparency during robot learning tasks in Human-Robot Interaction scenarios. Our model puts the human in the learning loop by using two categories of robot’s emotional/behavioural reactions, one associated with the learning process of the robot and another elicited as a response to the feedback provided by...
Non-anthropomorphic robots have issues in conveying internal state during a Human-Robot Interaction (HRI). A possible approach is to let robots communicate their states or intentions through emotions. However, the robot’s emotional responses are not always clearly identified by people, and it is also difficult to identify which and how many cues ar...
The Trust, Acceptance and Social Cues in Human-Robot Interaction - SCRITA is the 5th edition of a series of workshops held in conjunction with the IEEE RO-MAN conference. This workshop focuses on addressing the challenges and development of the dynamics between people and robots in order to foster short interactions and long-lasting relationships i...
The aim of this workshop is to foster the exchange of insights on past and ongoing research towards effective and long-lasting collaborations between humans and robots. This workshop will provide a forum for representatives from academia and industry communities to analyse the different aspects of HRI that impact on its success. We particularly foc...
BRILLO (Bartending Robot for Interactive Long-Lasting Operations) project has the overall goal of creating an autonomous robotic bartender that can interact with customers while accomplishing its bartending tasks. In such a scenario, people's novelty effect connected to the use of an attractive technology is destined to wear off and, consequently,...
The design of natural human–robot dynamics is a key aspect for ensuring a successful and efficient lasting human–robot interaction (HRI). In particular, it is expected that a robot deployed in human populated environments not only needs to be able to successfully complete a task, but also needs to show social intelligence to engage people in effect...
The aim of this work is to understand how individuals’ personality differences affect their interaction with robots considering the robots expressed personalities and their occupational roles. For this purpose, we analysed the link between the degree of extroversion/introversion of the user and the one expressed by the robot during two different ta...
In this study, we employed Furhat to investigate how people attribute gender to a robot and whether the attribution of gender might elicit stereotypes already at a first impression. We involved 223 participants in an online study and asked them to rate 15 of Furhat’s predefined faces in terms of femininity, masculinity, communion, and agency, and i...
Effective and successful interactions between robots and people are possible only when they both are able to infer the other’s intentions, beliefs, and goals. In particular, robots’ mental models need to be transparent to be accepted by people and facilitate the collaborations between the involved parties. In this study, we focus on investigating h...
Personalised experiences with service robots positively affect people’s perception of the robot and, consequently, foster the success of the interaction. This implies that people need to share their personal information with the robot, which could let people feel uneasy when such interactions happen in public spaces or in the presence of strangers....
This workshop aimed for a deeper exploration of trust and acceptance in human-robot interaction (HRI) from a multidisciplinary perspective including robots' capabilities of sensing and perceiving other agents, the environment, and human-robot dynamics. The workshop was held online in conjunction with IEEE RO-MAN 2021 (see https://ro-man2021.org/)....
This paper introduces benefits and detriments of a robot bartender that is capable of adapting the interaction with human users according to their preferences in drinks, music, and hobbies. We believe that a personalised experience during a human-robot interaction increases the human user's engagement with the robot and that such information will b...
The aim of this workshop is to give researchers from academia and industry the possibility to discuss the inter-and multi-disciplinary nature of the relationships between people and robots towards effective and long-lasting collaborations. This workshop will provide a forum for the HRI and robotics communities to explore successful human-robot inte...
Some applications of service robots within domestic and working environments are envisaged to be a significant part of our lives in the not too distant future. They are developed to autonomously accomplish different tasks either on behalf of or in collaboration with a human being. Robots can perceive and interpret data from the external environment...
Trust has been established to be a key factor in fostering human-robot interactions. However, trust can change overtime according to different factors, including a breach of trust due to a robot’s error. In this exploratory study, we observed people’s interactions with a companion robot in a real house, adapted for human-robot interaction experimen...
As we expect that the presence of autonomous robots in our everyday life will increase, we must consider that people will have not only to accept robots to be a fundamental part of their lives, but they will also have to trust them to reliably and securely engage them in collaborative tasks. Several studies showed that robots are more comfortable i...
Identifying the roles and the specific social behaviours that evoke human trust towards robots is key for user acceptance. Specially, while performing tasks in the real world, such as navigation or guidance, the predictability of robot motion and predictions of user intentions facilitate interaction. We present a user study in which a humanoid-robo...
We participated in the RoboCup 2018 competition in Montreal with our newly developed BoldBot based on the Darwin-OP and mostly self-printed custom parts. This paper is about the lessons learnt from that competition and further developments for the RoboCup 2019 competition. Firstly, we briefly introduce the team along with an overview of past achiev...
This work investigates how human awareness about a social robot's capabilities is related to trusting this robot to handle different tasks. We present a user study that relates knowledge on different quality levels to participant's ratings of trust. Secondary school pupils were asked to rate their trust in the robot after three types of exposures:...
Humans should be able to trust that they can safely interact with their home companion robot. However, robots can exhibit occasional mechanical, programming or functional errors. We hypothesise that the severity of the consequences and the timing of a robot’s different types of erroneous behaviours during an interaction may have different impacts o...
The University of Hertfordshire aims to support a research-rich environment that informs teaching. As part of the University's strategic plan it would like to encourage students to develop an understanding of the history and role of research in computer science. In all of our computer science degrees at the University we teach a module called Conte...
As robots increasingly take part in daily living activities, humans will have to interact with them in domestic and other human-oriented environments. We can expect that domestic robots will exhibit occasional mechanical, programming or functional errors, as occur with other electrical consumer devices. For example, these errors could include softw...
Trust is a key factor in human users’ acceptance of robots in a home or human oriented environment. Humans should be able to trust that they can safely interact with their robot. Robots will sometimes make errors, due to mechanical or functional failures. It is therefore important that a domestic robot should have acceptable interactive behaviours...
In an era in which robots take a part in our lives in daily living activities, humans have to trust robots in home environments. We aim to create guidelines that allow humans to trust robots to be able to look after their well-being by adopting human-like behaviours. We want to study a Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) to assess whether a certain degre...
Single-human supervision of collaborative sem-iautonomous multi-robot teams is recently getting the attention of the robotic community. In this context, the adoption of a growing number of robots does not necessarily produce a gain in performance, due to the increased workload of the human supervisor. However, enabling human operators to communicat...
Decision-making activities in planning a city visit typically include a pre–visit hunt for information. Hence, users spend the most of the time consulting web portals in the pre–trip phase. The possibility of obtaining social media data and providing user-generated content are powerful tools for help users in the decision process. In this work, we...
The problem of allocating tasks to a team of robots composing a complex activity with global performance constraints to be met, is NP-hard. Automated negotiation was proposed as a viable heuristic approach allowing for the dynamic adjustment of the performance levels provided by the single robots in the case of robots with limited resources. This a...
In the last years, we assisted to an increase of healthcare facilities based on the adoption of robotic devices in patients daily life scenarios. In these contexts, the time needed to monitor the patients' state is a crucial issue in order to limit the occurrence of emergencies. For this reason, the adoption of multi-robot systems (MRSs) allowing t...