Investigating the influence of haptic feedback in rover navigation with communication delay

Abstract

Safe navigation on rough terrain in the presence of unforeseen obstacles is an indispensable element of many robotic applications. In such conditions, autonomous navigation is often not a viable option within certain safety margins. Yet, a human-in-the-loop can also be arduous to include in the system, especially in scenarios where a communication delay is present. Haptic force feedback has been shown to provide benefits in rover navigation, also when confronted with higher communication delays. Therefore, in this paper we present the results of a user study comparing various performance metrics when controlling a rover with a car-like interface with and without fictitious force feedback, both with no communication delay and with a delay of 800 ms. The results indicate that with force feedback the navigation is slower, but task performance in the proximity of obstacles is improved.