Publication

This paperpresents the results of an evaluation study on the use of telepresence robots in higher education. For the first time, infour seminars,35 teacher traineestook part both viatelepresence robot andviaSkype videoconference. Overall,we foundthat students showeda high acceptance ofusing telepresence robotsin higher education. Students’ acceptance was already high at the beginning of the seminars, increased further during the seminars,and exceeded the acceptance ofusingconventional videoconferences at the end of the seminars. In addition, students did not find the presence of the robots very disturbing. Telepresence robots thus represent a promising option for enabling students to participate interactively in courses if physical participation is not possible for them.