Abstract
Walking can be thought of as a social interaction. It is also thought that a mobile robot and people around it can make social interaction during walking together. Investigating the interaction of people around a mobile robot will lead the development of mobile robots to be more acceptable for society. The authors have built a robot "Walking-Bones" that tries to walk with people while expressing its internal state by looking around. In this study, we conducted fieldwork in elementary school and analyzed children's actions toward "Walking-Bones" to consider how children perceived "Walking-Bones". As a result, 1st and 2nd-grade children tended to have actions such as patting the robot's head, and they regarded "Walking-Bones" as something they could sympathize with. On the other hand, the 5th-grade children observed "Walking-Bones" from a distance, and regarded it as an existence that they could not immediately sympathize with but could understand. In addition, when "Walking-Bones" turned its face to the surrounding environment and people around them, children often looked into the robot's face and blocked its path. Furthermore, regardless of the experimental condition of "Walking-Bones", the behavior that children helped "Walking-Bones" was observed many times.
