Human Pain Relief by Simultaneously Grasping and Being Grasped by a Robot Hand

Abstract

This paper introduces a robot hands, consist of two different sizes, which is developed for social touch in human-robot interaction. Previous studies have reported that the social touch can be established in human-robot condition, like in human-human condition, and also in case without extensive prior bonding with robot. We hypothesized that pain relief, one of the positive effects from social touch, could be obtained from social touch in human-robot interactions. In this work, we introduce a novel design concept, two different sizes of robot hands is consisting of a small size robot hand like a baby's hand and a normal size robot hand such as an adult's. This design concept of robot hand we propose makes user's hand to be grasped(wrapped) by the normal size robot hand simultaneously when they grasp the small size of it, and this mechanism is intended to reduce user's pain perception in conditions when they feels pain.