Classification of construction professionals’ attitudes toward using robots in applications of Human Robot Collaboration

Robotics are an emerging technology in the construction industry that have the potential to improve productivity and safety in both offsite and onsite applications. However, due to the highly customized nature of architectural and engineering designs and the dynamic environment of construction job sites, most robotic systems still require human intervention to function properly. This collaboration between human workers and robots, known as Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC), faces economic, technical, and social barriers to widespread adoption. While much research has been focused on reducing the technical barriers of HRC implementation in the construction industry, there has been less attention given to social barriers, such as technology acceptance. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the attitudes of construction professionals towards HRC in their workplace. A survey was conducted among recent graduates of a Construction Management program in the U.S., and a latent class analysis was conducted to identify distinct sub-groups, or classes, of attitudes towards HRC. The results of the study revealed three distinct classes of attitudes held by respondents—Controller, Assistant, and Partner—each representing a comfort level with a different set of interactions with robots. Tests of association between membership in these classes and the demographics of respondents revealed no significant relationships, suggesting that attitudes towards HRC are not attributable to differences in gender, age, experience, or education. These findings provide insights for manufacturers of construction robotics about potential users' attitudes towards HRC, which can be considered in the design and implementation of new robotic systems that are more likely to be accepted by practitioners.