Estimating Human Intention During a Human–Robot Cooperative Task Based on the Internal Force Model

Several successful strategies have been proposed for collaborative physical human–robot interactions (pHRI). However, few have recognized the role the internal force plays in making the collaboration smooth. The aim of this paper is to investigate this role. In order to identify the characteristics of forces applied in a natural (human-like) interaction, we first study the human–human cooperation in a dyadic reaching movement task. We propose a novel method to estimate the internal force and show that it has several advantages compared to the existing methods. We then show that there is a component in the dyad’s internal force that is strongly correlated with the object’s velocity. We use this component as an abstract model for the human intent. This allows us to formulate a cooperation policy that allows the robot to properly respond to the human. We suggest that integrating this policy with the existing cooperation strategies improves the collaboration between the human and the robot.

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