Towards a sociable robot guide which respects and supports the human activity

This paper presents a framework to provide the human with the flexibility to behave naturally, while being guided by a mobile robot. A sociable robot should not expect that the human will always follow the exact trajectory of the robot or will always maintain a fixed distance with robot. Moreover human can choose either to accompany or to follow the robot during the guiding. Robot should also not expect that human will always support the guiding. Human may temporarily suspend the joint commitment of guiding process, due to other interesting tasks and may completely abandon the path expected by robot. As a ´social´ guide, robot should not only tolerate human diverse behaviors but also try to adapt its path to support the human activity as well as influence the human path towards the goal. It should take appropriate decision about when, where and how to deviate, as the very frequent or unnatural maneuvers of robot will make the human feel uncomfortable. In this paper we present a framework of monitoring and adapting to the human commitment on the joint task, and carrying out appropriate and goal oriented re-engagement attempts, if required, from the view point of guiding.