Fake it to make it: Exploratory prototyping in HRI

Exploratory prototyping techniques are critical to devising new robot forms, actions, and behaviors, and to eliciting human responses to designed interactive features, early in the design process. In this opinion piece, we establish the contribution of exploratory prototyping to the field of human-robot interaction, arguing research engaged in design exploration-rather than controlled experimentation-should be focused on flexibility rather than specificity, possibility rather than replicability, and design insights as incubated subjectively through the designer rather than dispassionately proven by statistical analysis. We draw on literature in HCI for examples of published design explorations in academic venues, and to suggest how analogous contributions can be valued and evaluated by the HRI community. Lastly, we present and examine case studies of three design methods we have used in our own design work: physical prototyping with human-in-the-loop control, video prototyping, and virtual simulations.