Researchers from the University of Cambridge carried out a study in a tech consultancy firm using two different robot wellbeing coaches, where 26 employees participated in weekly robot-led wellbeing sessions for four weeks. Although the robots had identical voices, facial expressions, and scripts for the sessions, the robots’ physical appearance affected how participants interacted with it.

Participants who did their wellbeing exercises with a toy-like robot said that they felt more of a connection with their ‘coach’ than participants who worked with a humanoid-like robot. The researchers say that perception of robots is affected by popular culture, where the only limit on what robots can do is the imagination. When faced with a robot in the real world however, it often does not live up to expectations.

Since the toy-like robot looks simpler, participants may have had lower expectations and ended up finding the robot easier to talk connect with. Participants who worked with the humanoid robot found that their expectations didn’t match reality, since the robot was not capable of having interactive conversations.

Despite the differences between expectations and reality, the researchers say that their study shows that robots can be a useful tool to promote mental wellbeing in the workplace. The results will be reported today (15 March) at the ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction in Stockholm.

The World Health Organization recommends that employers take action to promote and protect mental wellbeing at work, but the implementation of wellbeing practices is often limited by a lack of resources and personnel. Robots have shown some early promise for helping address this gap, but most studies on robots and wellbeing have been conducted in a laboratory setting.

“We wanted to take the robots out of the lab and study how they might be useful in the real world,” said Dr Micol Spitale, the paper’s first author.

The researchers collaborated with local technology company Cambridge Consultants to design and implement a workplace wellbeing programme using robots. Over the course of four weeks, employees were guided through four different wellbeing exercises by one of two robots: either the QTRobot (QT) or the Misty II robot (Misty).

The QT is a childlike humanoid robot and roughly 90cm tall, while Misty is a 36cm tall toy-like robot. Both robots have screen faces that can be programmed with different facial expressions.

“We interviewed different wellbeing coaches and then we programmed our robots to have a coach-like personality, with high openness and conscientiousness,” said co-author Minja Axelsson. “The robots were programmed to have the same personality, the same facial expressions and the same voice, so the only difference between them was the physical robot form.”

Participants in the experiment were guided through different positive psychology exercises by a robot in an office meeting room. Each session started with the robot asking participants to recall a positive experience or describe something in their lives they were grateful for, and the robot would ask follow-up questions. After the sessions, participants were asked to assess the robot with a questionnaire and an interview. Participants did one session per week for four weeks, and worked with the same robot for each session.

Participants who worked with the toy-like Misty robot reported that they had a better working connection with the robot than participants who worked with the child-like QT robot. Participants also had a more positive perception of Misty overall.

“It could be that since the Misty robot is more toy-like, it matched their expectations,” said Spitale. “But since QT is more humanoid, they expected it to behave like a human, which may be why participants who worked with QT were slightly underwhelmed.”

“The most common response we had from participants was that their expectations of the robot didn’t match with reality,” said Professor Hatice Gunes from Cambridge’s Department of Computer Science and Technology, who led the research. “We programmed the robots with a script, but participants were hoping there would be more interactivity. It’s incredibly difficult to create a robot that’s capable of natural conversation. New developments in large language models could really be beneficial in this respect.”

“Our perceptions of how robots should look or behave might be holding back the uptake of robotics in areas where they can be useful,” said Axelsson.

Although the robots used in the experiment are not as advanced as C-3PO or other fictional robots, participants still said they found the wellbeing exercises helpful, and that they were open to the idea of talking to a robot in future.

“The robot can serve as a physical reminder to commit to the practice of wellbeing exercises,” said Gunes. “And just saying things out loud, even to a robot, can be helpful when you’re trying to improve mental wellbeing.”

The team is now working to enhance the robot coaches’ responsiveness during the coaching practices and interactions.

The research was supported by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). Hatice Gunes is a Staff Fellow of Trinity Hall, Cambridge.

Three research teams led by Professor Hyung Joon Cha of the Chemical Engineering Department at Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), Professor Yun Kee Jo of the School of Convergence at Kyungpook National University (KNU), and Professor Sang Ho Jun of the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at Korea University Anam Hospital together developed an osteogenic barrier coating material for dental implants that prevents the invasion of soft tissue cells, attracts osteo-progenitor cells including bone stem cells, and sustainably releases the loaded bone morphogenetic protein-2 (BMP-2), significantly facilitating bone regeneration.

GBR is widely used in dental implant placement. It maintains the space for bones to grow and prevents cells other than osteogenic cells, such as fibroblasts, from populating the bone defect sites, allowing the bone to grow without interference by non-osteogenic cells. However, the GBR approach is still less likely to be successful and requires longer treatment time for those patients with insufficient bone quantity and quality. Depending on the configurations of defect sites, preventing the invasion of the non-osteogenic cells by using barrier membranes alone is not enough to significantly facilitate the bone regeneration.

The joint research team first loaded BMP-2 on top of the bioengineered material where RGD peptide, cell recognitive motif that is capable of attracting cells, is fused with mussel adhesive protein (MAP) that maintains strong adhesiveness in a wet environment. The team then coated the titanium mesh (Ti-mesh) membrane with it. According to the research findings, the coated barrier membrane exhibited cell occlusivity where fibroblasts could not permeate the membrane. The team also found that it induced a high level of bone differentiation in a short period of time inside the membrane by means of high growth of mesenchymal stem cells and release of BMP-2.

Application of the developed MAP-based barrier coating for guided bone regeneration to a titanium membrane in a rat calvarial defect model showed that the coating roughly doubled the speed of bone tissue regeneration.

Professor Hyung Joon Cha who led the research said, “This research was conducted based on long-term research cooperation of the joint research team in the area of bone regeneration for implant placement. Its findings revealed the possibility of improving the success rate of implant treatment regardless of the bone condition.” He added that the research findings could also be applied to regenerate a variety of hard tissues.

The research findings were published in the online edition of the Bioengineering & Translational Medicine, a distinguished journal in the field of bioengineering and regenerative medicine. The study was conducted as a part of the Dentistry Technology R&D Project under the Korea Health Technology R&D Project funded by the Ministry of Health & Welfare, the High Value-added Food Technology Development Program funded by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food & Rural Affairs, and the BK21 Four Program by the National Research Foundation of Korea.

Researchers from UNSW Sydney and the Australian Institute of Botanical Science, part of the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust, surveyed 33 major online databases of plant photographs to examine the photographic record of Australian plant species. The findings, published in New Phytologist, reveal out of 21,077 native Australian vascular plant species, almost 20 per cent lack a verifiable photograph.

Lead author of the study and UNSW Science PhD student Thomas Mesaglio says Australia is one of the richest areas in the world for native species.

“It was surprising to see how many plant species had just line drawings, illustrations, paintings, or even no media at all,” Mr Mesaglio says.

Dr Hervé Sauquet, co-author of the study and Senior Research Scientist at the Australian Institute of Botanical Science, is based at the National Herbarium of New South Wales.

“All species of plants ultimately rely on specimens in herbarium collections for their identification,” Dr Sauquet says. “Yet, even in this digital age where most herbarium specimens have been scanned and are accessible on the web, photos of live plants in the wild remain in critical need.”

Senior author of the study from UNSW Science Associate Professor Will Cornwell says a lack of detailed photos can have real consequences. Many plant species that are difficult to identify in the wild may go extinct if scientists cannot properly identify them with the help of photos.

“We had assumed every plant species would have simply been photographed by someone, somewhere, throughout history. But it turns out this isn’t the case,” says A/Prof. Cornwell.

“This is where citizen scientists can come in and help us fill this gap with their photos.”

Gaps in the photographic record

Photographs can help botanists and taxonomists who work with plant specimens by preserving characteristics like flower colour that get lost over time in their samples. They can also show additional features, such as the orientation of leaves or bark appearance, and add ecological context.

“Having a comprehensive photographic set helps us to be confident in our identifications,” Mr Mesaglio says. “Particularly when it is practically challenging to collect and preserve the entire plant, photos complement the physical voucher by showing the soil type, the habitat it’s growing in, and other species growing alongside it.”

But it turns out not all plant groups are photographed equally. Just as some animals receive less attention than others, there might also be a bias against less charismatic plants.

The study found the most well-photographed plant groups tend to be shrubs or trees with more noticeable or spectacular features, such as colourful flowers. Banksia, for example, is one of only two Australian plant genera with more than 40 species to have a complete photographic record. Meanwhile, the family with the most significant photo deficit was Poaceae — commonly known as grasses — with 343 unphotographed species.

“We noticed a charisma deficit, so the species that tend to be harder to see are the ones missing out,” Mr Mesaglio says. “They may have innocuous or pale-looking flowers or be smaller and harder to spot grasses, sedges and herbs.”

Geography also affected the photographic record. While most species across the south-eastern states of Australia have comprehensive records, Western Australia had the largest void, with 52 per cent of all unphotographed species found there.

“The primary ‘hotspots’ for unphotographed Australian plants are areas with high plant diversity, but the environments are rugged and often difficult to access, particularly by road,” Mr Mesaglio says. “But it means there’s an exciting opportunity to visit these locations because we might capture something that has never before been photographed.”

Activating citizen scientist snaps

It’s one thing to have comprehensive photographic records for professional scientists to use in identification guides. But when the plant world is under threat from multiple fronts, including habitat clearing and climate change, photos can help engage the public in plant science.

“People can engage with, sympathise with, and get much more excited about plants with photographs, which is vital when our natural environments are more at risk than ever,” Mr Mesaglio says.

“Because digital photography is so accessible now, anyone can also help make a meaningful contribution to science using the camera in their pocket.”

Using a platform like iNaturalist, keen citizen scientists can have their snaps identified by experts and share the data with aggregators like the Atlas of Living Australia and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility to be used in research and conservation.

“Since April last year, we’ve identified nearly 10 per cent of those previously unphotographed species thanks to members of the public uploading their photographs and experts who’ve kindly identified them,” Mr Mesaglio says. “There could be many more in personal collections or behind paywalls just waiting to be shared.”

The researchers recommend a standardised system for scientific plant photography be developed, starting with a requirement in the International Code of Nomenclature for Plants to include at least one field photograph where possible in new species descriptions. They also suggest all new species descriptions be published as Open Access in searchable databases with Creative Commons licensing to maximise their usage.

“We also suspect more photos exist, but they’re hidden away on social media or behind scientific paywalls that aren’t accessible, discoverable, or searchable,” Mr Mesaglio says.

“Of the species with photographs, many have a single photo. We not only want to capture those unrepresented species but also continue building the photographic record for all species.

“Doing so will help us identify, monitor and conserve our native species for generations to come.”