Effects of Providing Demonstrations of Robot Reliability

When people start to work with a robot, they may not fully understand its capabilities, leading to potential misuse, mismatched expectations, and an inability to diagnose and resolve the robot's failures. Robots can provide users with demonstrations in an attempt to reduce misunderstanding. We conducted a between-subjects in-person study (N=131) where participants watched a demonstration and then completed a collaborative task with the robot. We found that participants were able to accurately understand the robot's demonstrated reliability. We discuss the impacts of these demonstrations on participants' trust in the robot, perception of the robot's capabilities, and willingness to allocate tasks to the robot.