Collaborative Robots for Empowering People: Key Insights from an OzCHI Workshop

There is an increased interest towards robotic platforms for close and direct collaboration with people, given the benefits of utilising the complimentary capabilities of people and robots. This calls for research that considers how people are involved in design and development of these platforms. The term "empowerment"transverses Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) research domains and disciplines, including the OzCHI community. Approaches to empower people vary between these disciplines and domains, creating a need for clarifying and consolidating the different roles people play in HRC research. This paper summarises the why, when, how, and who of empowerment in HRC, drawing from insights gathered in an academic workshop at the OzCHI conference in 2023. We present five key characteristics relating to the ways that empowerment in HRC can be facilitated, along with barriers and pathways towards those characteristics.