Usability Evaluation of a Raspberry-Pi Telepresence Robot Controlled by Android Smartphones

Telepresence robots in static pan-tilt form can be a viable and affordable choice for tele-education. However, cost considerations may impose limitations on usability and expected performance. The goal of this study was to explore the usability of a low-cost, static pan-tilt telepresence robot operated using an Android smartphone. Experiments were carried out with 26 participants from two age groups (14 students M = 20 years, 12 staff M = 25 years) in a laboratory. Each participant interacted with the robot to perform two tasks. The opinions of the participants preand post-experiments, and the time they took to complete the tasks, were recorded. The results show that the average latency (of 3.1 +/- 0.8 s for one robot movement) is quite acceptable. The students were faster than the staff when controlling the robot remotely but slower when working at the robot site. Correlation analysis shows that confidence in the robot and the likelihood of adoption is strongly related to data privacy features. All the methods used to control the robot remotely show positive interaction to each other. This implies that the majority of participants were focussed on the control methods and data privacy provided in the robot platform, and were willing to accept a small delay in robot movement.