5. Challenges in interaction robotics

5.1 Reality versus science fiction

Ultimately, one of the challenges of today's interaction robotics is to be able to develop robots that meet a certain number of user expectations, and whose interactions can be fairly rich, non-repetitive and sufficiently robust. User expectations are, however, highly varied and science-fictional.

There are many examples of pet robots in science fiction, both in literature and film. The companion robot is often endowed with other functionalities, and can perform a wide range of tasks:

• It can help with household chores or everyday tasks;

• it is generally endowed with speech;

• it can understand its user's emotions.

...