Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

3-16-2026

Department

Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Abstract

Augmented Reality (AR) is often promoted as a solution to the cognitive and physical demands of traditional Teach Pendant (TP) programming for collaborative robots. Although prior work has suggested advantages of the AR interface, many evaluations have been limited in scope and may not fully represent the complexities of real-world manufacturing tasks. This study compares the performance of an AR interface to that of a standard TP interface for manufacturing assembly tasks of varying difficulty. In a between-groups study, one group of operators completed standardized assembly tasks using the TP interface, while a separate group used the AR interface instead. We collected broad set of metrics, including task completion time, task success, physical exertion, and measured cognitive workload (NASA-TLX). The analysis showed that participants achieved higher success rates on the 16 mm rectangular peg task and waterproof connector tasks when using AR. They also completed the 12 mm circular peg task significantly faster. Although AR did not reduce cognitive workload relative to TP, these findings suggested that AR may be beneficial for tasks that required significant mental interpretation and offered little advantage for components with non-intuitive geometry. Overall, the results challenged the common assumption that AR universally outperforms traditional programming interfaces in manufacturing tasks. Instead, AR performance appears to be task-dependent and possibly influenced by factors such as task complexity.

Publisher's Statement

© 2026 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). Publisher’s version of record: https://doi.org/10.1145/3776734.3794344

Publication Title

Companion Proceedings of the 21st ACM IEEE International Conference on Human Robot Interaction Hri Companion 2026

ISBN

9798400723216

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Version

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