Usability of an assistive robot manipulator: Toward a quantitative user evaluation

This chapter describes our research activity on the integration of a robotic arm in the environment of persons with disabilities. People who have lost the abilities to use their proper arms to perform daily living task could use an adapted robot to compensate, even partly, the problems of objects manipulation generated by their handicap. Many robotized systems have been developed, however the manipulation of such robots by the disabled people is not always obvious. In this chapter, we provide original results on the evaluation of the new Manus software architecture called Commanus in reference to the European Commanus project terminated last year. A quantitative evaluation method has been developed and used to provide accurate data on the usability of Manus robot with the integration of new control modes. This work corresponds to 9 months of evaluation which involved 19 quadriplegics patients, mainly having spinal cord injuries and muscular dystrophies, from the rehabilitation hospital of Garches. Preliminary results on usability of the new software architecture of the robot, is described.