Patent ID: 7747350

Claim:
A robot that behaves autonomously while in contact with a user, the robot comprising: a drive unit; a storage unit operable to store a plurality of pieces of control information, each piece of control information of the plurality of pieces of control information defining a respective behavior of a plurality of behaviors of the robot; an acquisition unit operable to acquire, from a hint output device that provides a behavior hint to the robot, device hint information that suggests any behavior of the plurality of behaviors; a selection unit operable to select, from among the plurality of pieces of control information stored by the storage unit, a piece of control information that defines the behavior suggested by the acquired device hint information; and a drive control unit operable to control, based on the selected piece of control information, the drive unit such that the robot performs the behavior defined by the selected piece of control information, wherein the hint output device stores, as the device hint information, contact information indicating a contact between the hint output device and another robot, wherein the acquisition unit acquires the contact information from the hint output device, and wherein the selection unit selects the piece of control information according to the contact between the hint output device and the another robot indicated by the acquired contact information.