Hey TPS I Need Your Assistance - Social Perception of Telepresence Systems During a Collaborative Assembly Task

Remote support in general and via telepresence systems is a time- and resource-saving method. Since telepresence systems are very diverse in terms of their design, the question arises as to whether the design influences the perception of the remote assistant. The cooperative assembly study presented here examines four different looking telepresence systems. The results show that similarly designed systems yield only marginal differences, but a system that is designed to transport additional loads and is thus less anthropomorphic is rated significantly less positive than the other systems, even though the remote assistant was the same in all conditions. This highlights that the design of a telepresence system can influence the social evaluation of the remote assisting person.