Consideration and evaluation of benefits of human shaped service robots [The report of experimental introduction to a shopping center]

In Japan, human shaped service robots have rarely become commercial products so far and have not been widely utilized in actual fields. The reason is that people cannot determine clear objective for using these robots, and hence its usefulness or necessity are not valued. To clear these doubts, we have experimentally introduced a human shaped service robot to a shopping center, and clarified its benefits and issues. This paper describes the contents and results of our experiment. At the end of the article, we present the strategy how service robots could be used more effectively in various situations and how they could be expanded in Japan.