Participants
A total of 20 participants took part in the study, of whom 17 chose to disclose demographic information. Among these, 11 were identified as male, 5 as female, and 1 opted not to reveal their gender. Participant ages ranged from 19 to 67 years (M = 32.12, SD = 11.17).
The group was geographically diverse, with 10 participants from Europe, 4 from Asia, 1 from Africa, and 2 from South America. Educational backgrounds included 5 PhD students, 8 Master students, and 4 undergraduates.
Most participants reported some prior experience with robots, with 19 out of 20 participants reporting experience. Eighteen out of 20 considered themselves proficient with controllers or simulators. All expressed a positive outlook on the growing role of robots in daily life and workplace tasks.
Study Environment and Context
The study took place at the Bristol Robotics Laboratory in Bristol, UK, where participants interacted with the interface. The teleoperated robot manipulator was located remotely at IIT in Genova, Italy.
The joystick controller and keyboard were standard commercial products. The touchscreen-based interface was implemented on a 13-inch HP Spectre x360 Convertible laptop with an ELAN2514 touch controller.
The experiments employed a Franka Emika Panda robotic arm fitted with an ATI Mini45 six-axis force/torque sensor to perform swabbing over a flat surface. An Azure VPN connected the operator station in Bristol, UK, to the robot site in Genoa, Italy, streaming ROS topics with a verified round-trip latency below 100 ms.
Ethics
This study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of the University of the West of England, College of Arts, Technology & Environment (Reference: 13470965).
A participant information sheet was provided to all participants before they consented to take part, and signed consent forms were collected before the experiments started. Appropriate measures were taken to ensure participant confidentiality and data security throughout the study.
Participants had the right to withdraw at any point and to request the removal of their data up to seven days following the study.
Teleoperation Control Implementation
The communication architecture for the teleoperation setup involved four PCs located in different countries.
In Bristol, UK, PC1 served as the human–robot interface, capturing finger-position data and displaying the robot’s camera feed. PC2 logged experimental data.
In Genoa, Italy, PC3 converted position-reference data into a time-synchronised ROS topic, and PC4 acted as the ROS Master, controlling the Franka Emika Panda arm and enforcing safety constraints.
All PCs were connected to the same virtual network through a VPN, with wired links ensuring reliable performance.
Hypotheses
Building on research in collaborative human–robot interaction, three hypotheses were formulated:
- Participants in condition C3, supervisory one-click autonomy, will have the lowest cognitive load compared with the other two teleoperation conditions.
- Participants in condition C2, the touchscreen interface, will exhibit significantly lower workload and higher trust ratings than participants in the baseline condition C1, the joystick interface.
- Participants who are spatially skilled or have gaming experience will display lower blink-rate elevations, smaller galvanic skin response spikes, and shorter completion times than low-skill users in condition C1. These differences are expected to diminish in conditions C2 and C3.
Discussion
The remaining hypothesis, H3, was only partially supported after incorporating interface perception and force-control context into the analysis. Skill-related differences were less pronounced than expected, but some traces emerged in interaction with interface perception.
Limitations include the 20-participant sample and a single short familiarization period. These limitations leave the touchscreen’s learning curve and skill transfer uncharacteristic. The study also used non-professional operators in a laboratory setting.
Future work will add haptic feedback, adaptive shared control driven by real-time load and trust, and a longitudinal study with industry experts. These studies will separate intrinsic interface effects from prior familiarity and assess operational robustness.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many participants took part in the study? A total of 20 participants took part, although only 17 disclosed demographic information.
Where were the operator and robot located? Participants operated the interface at the Bristol Robotics Laboratory in the UK, while the robot manipulator was located at IIT in Genova, Italy.
What robot was used in the experiments? The experiments used a Franka Emika Panda robotic arm fitted with an ATI Mini45 six-axis force/torque sensor.
What are the planned areas of future work? Future work will investigate haptic feedback, adaptive shared control based on real-time load and trust, and longitudinal testing with industry experts.