The integration of the physical capabilities of an industrial collaborative robot with a social virtual character may represent a viable solution to enhance the workers' perception of the system as an embodied social entity and increase social engagement and well-being at the workplace. An online study was setup using prerecorded video interactions in order to pilot potential advantages of different embodied configurations of the cobot-avatar system in terms of perceptions of Social Presence, cobot-avatar Unity and Social Role of the system, and explore the relation of these. In particular, two different configurations were explored and compared: the virtual character was displayed either on a tablet strapped onto the base of the cobot or on a large TV screen positioned at the back of the workcell. The results imply that participants showed no clear preference based on the constructs, and both configurations fulfill these basic criteria. In terms of the relations between the constructs, there were strong correlations between perception of Social Presence, Unity and Social Role (Collegiality). This gives a valuable insight into the role of these constructs in the perception of cobots as embodied social entities, and towards building cobots that support well-being at the workplace.

翻译：将工业协作机器人的物理能力与社交虚拟角色整合，可能是一种可行方案，以增强工人将系统视为社交实体存在的感知，并提升工作场所的社交参与感和幸福感。本研究通过预录视频交互设置了一项在线实验，旨在初步探索协作机器人-虚拟化身系统不同实体配置在社交临场感、系统统一性及社交角色感知方面的潜在优势，并考察这些构念间的关联。具体而言，实验比较了两种配置：虚拟角色分别显示在绑附于协作机器人基座的平板电脑上，或位于工作单元后方的超大电视屏幕上。结果表明，参与者基于这些构念未表现出明确偏好，且两种配置均满足了基本标准。在构念间的关联方面，社交临场感、系统统一性与社交角色（协作性）感知之间存在强相关性。这一发现为理解这些构念在协作机器人作为社交实体被感知过程中的作用提供了重要洞见，并有助于构建能够支持工作场所幸福感的协作机器人。