How Do Robot Experts Measure the Success of Social Robot Navigation?

Nathan Tsoi, Jessica Romero, Marynel Vázquez

Abstract: We interviewed 8 individuals from industry and academia to better understand how they valued different aspects of social robot navigation. Interviewees were asked to rank the importance of 10 measures commonly used to evaluate social navigation policies. Interviewees were then asked open-ended questions about social navigation, and how they think about evaluating the challenges they face. Our interviews with industry and academic experts in social navigation revealed that avoiding collisions was the only universally important measure. Beyond the safety consideration of avoiding collisions, roboticists have varying priorities regarding social navigation. Given the high priority interviewees placed on safety, we recommend that social navigation approaches should first aim to ensure safety. Once safety is ensured, we recommend that each social navigation algorithm be evaluated using the measures most relevant to the intended application domain.