The concept of collaboration between humans and robots, also referred to as Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC), encompasses different interactive levels where robotic systems and humans coexists in shared spaces. These levels range from independent workspaces to cooperation and collaboration. While this collaboration extends beyond social robotics, it plays a pivotal role in addressing the increasing complexity and dynamism of modern manufacturing processes. Human-Robot Interactions (HRIs) have been traditionally built around physical interactions, which normally focus the effort on the development of safety mechanisms, as well as on studies related to the physical aspects, e.g. safety, collision avoidance. However, as these interactions become beyond the physical ones, the multidisciplinary field of HRI has expanded to include social studies as well. It aims at creating genuine collaborative systems which emphasize the main added value through the interactions with reference to individual actions and tasks, rather than merely jobs or workplaces. In these emerging scenarios, the creation of trust is key within the dynamic interaction‐based relationship, leading to enhanced social abilities, performance and well-being.

Researchers and practitioners often prioritize finding technical solutions in their designs, following a techno‐centric approach that favors task allocation to automated systems, thus placing the human in a supervisory role to determine the objectives, to fine-tune the parameters, constraints, and rules. In contrast, a human‐centered approach recognizes the importance of involving the human operator in the decision-making process, allowing them to actively participate in shaping the system's dynamics; i.e. the construction of decisions, full awareness of the state at runtime, and being an important decisional part while keeping an appropriate workload balance. Recent advancements have showcased the implementation of human-centered approaches in various areas, such as advance path planning for collision avoidance at runtime, or task assignation methodologies for workload balance. The complexity of the interactive phenomena between humans and robots in industrial scenarios challenges the responsible embracement of new roles for operators from a socially sustainable way that promotes the human well‐being. This Research Topic aims at understanding the importance of the human factor to design and develop new technology that closely interacts with humans, and whose functionality really leads to an increase in performance, safety, and efficiency avoiding misuse and/or disuse, following the human-centered design (HCD) concept.

This research topic welcomes relevant works that boost the inclusion of the HCD concept into HRI studies in manufacturing to potentially create more symbiotic and natural interactions. Key research areas cover, but are not limited to:
- Behavioral knowledge and interaction models (perception and cognition).
- Theory of mind in HRI.
- Trust creation mechanisms and acceptance in HRI.
- Analysis of multimodal interfaces.
- Human factors and ergonomics in HRI.
- Workload balance mechanisms and task assignment tools.
- Intelligent agents in HRI.
- Workspace design guidelines in HRI.
- Assessment of HRI.
- Ethical considerations in HRI.
Submissions may include literature reviews, original research articles and use cases in industrial scenarios.

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