Professor Kerstin Dautenhahn and her team from the University of Hertfordshire Science and Technology Research Institute have conducted a study regarding people and the robot companion they choose.
The project was an investigation on people and what type of robot they would prefer to interact with and in what manner. For their study, the team looked at two very broad personality types–extroverted and introverted. Their thery is that robots should not be build and then have programs applied to them prior to placement, but rather that people should be involved with the building of robots they are going to interact with.
Their findings have shown that people with extrovert type personalities prefer humanoid robots whereas introverts tend to lean toward more machanical looking models.
