  Quadruped robots have the potential to guide blind and low vision (BLV)
people due to their highly flexible locomotion and emotional value provided by
their bionic forms. However, the development of quadruped guide robots rarely
involves BLV users' participatory designs and evaluations. In this paper, we
conducted two empirical experiments both in indoor controlled and outdoor field
scenarios, exploring the benefits and drawbacks of quadruped guide robots. The
results show that the nowadays commercial quadruped robots exposed significant
disadvantages in usability and trust compared with wheeled robots. It is
concluded that the moving gait and walking noise of quadruped robots would
limit the guiding effectiveness to a certain extent, and the empathetic effect
of its bionic form for BLV users could not be fully reflected. Based on the
findings of wheeled robots and quadruped robots' advantages, we discuss the
design implications for the future guide robot design for BLV users. This paper
reports the first empirical experiment about quadruped guide robots with BLV
users and preliminary explores their potential improvement space in
substituting guide dogs, which can inspire the further specialized design of
quadruped guide robots.
