Human robot interaction as a service for combatting COVID-19: an experimental case study

COVID-19 pandemic has changed today's routines in a variety of fields such as society, economics, health, etc. It is surely known that the most powerful weapon to fight against the disease is the social distancing. Hence, it is strongly recommended by the authorities to decrease human to human interaction (HHI) in order to stop the spread. However, daily routine of people must continue somehow, because of the fact that it is not known when the pandemic will end permanently. Thus, new approaches should be adapted in social environments for COVID-19 prevention. Human robot interaction (HRI) can be seen as a vital mechanism to provide risk free routines in the society. For this purpose, we offer a human robot interaction as a service (HRIaaS) for eatery locations such as restaurants, cafes, etc. where customers should interact with the staff. The proposed service aims to utilize personal smartphones and decrease the number of HHIs for such environments in which strange people involved. Moreover, an experimental case study is conducted to obtain an evaluation with a real world scenario when the proposed service is used versus a contemporary routine with HHIs. The evaluation results show that an average reduction of 41% is achieved per customer in the number of HHIs between customers and serving staff.