Simultaneous versus incremental learning of multiple skills by modular robots

This paper is concerned with the problem of learning multiple skills by modular robots. The main question we address is whether it is better to learn multiple skills simultaneously (all-at-once) or incrementally (one-by-one). We conduct an experimental study with modular robots of various morphologies that need to acquire three different but correlated skills, efficient locomotion, navigation towards a target point, and obstacle avoidance, using a real-time, on-board evolution as the learning method. The results indicate that the one-by-one strategy is more efficient and more stable than the all-at-once strategy. © 2014 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.