HCC: Medium: Social and Moral Relationships With Personified Robots

该奖项是根据2009年《美国复苏和再投资法案》(公法111-5)提供资金的。这个项目将调查人们与人格化机器人的社会和道德关系。这些机器人以各种方式和不同程度地体现了人的方方面面，因为它们具有个性，具有适应性和自主性，可以说话、学习、使用自然提示和自我组织。这个项目将完成五个相辅相成的调查：(1)关于成年人是否相信类人机器人有感觉、智能、可以成为朋友、自主和具有道德地位的研究(即，可能是不公平行为和无端心理伤害的接受者)。(2)关于儿童、青少年和成年人认为机器人对其对人类造成的伤害负有责任的程度的研究。(3)一项关于道德地位和责任的研究，考察儿童、青少年和成年人是否认为类人机器人最像人类、儿童、动物或物体--或者是一种新的技术流派。(4)研究儿童、青少年和成年人是否认为机器人是产生信任和可以信任的实体。(5)人-机器人交互中的社会性模式的设计研究，该设计研究表征了人与机器人之间的社会交互的基本特征。总而言之，这一系列工作将首次系统地描述社会和道德行为，并与一个横跨童年、青春期和成年期的类人机器人进行推理。在基础科学方面，这个项目将检验这样一个假设，即人们不会简单地表现得就像是社会性的(就像戏剧中的“角色”一样)，而是真诚而有意义地将拟人化机器人作为社会他人，甚至在某些方面作为道德他人。与此同时，该项目将确定人与机器人互动的程度，而不是简单地将人与人之间的互动(或人与动物之间的互动)映射到机器人上，而是代表一种新的流派：技术但充满活力、人格化、响应性和看似自主。随着拟人化机器人变得越来越普遍，并融入人们的日常社交生活，它们将在社会和道德上给儿童和成年人带来重大挑战。具体的挑战将取决于机器人是如何设计的，它们的使用环境，以及人们实际如何与这些机器人互动。未来，机器人可能会成为老年人的照看助手、儿童的学术辅导老师，或者是医疗助手、日托助手或心理咨询师。因此，重要的是从一开始就了解不同年龄段的人是如何对机器人做出反应的，并将它们日益复杂的行为概念化。在不久的将来，公众很可能会对人格化机器人引入社会提出严重的担忧。例如，人们可能会担心，与人格化的机器人互动将使主从关系具体化(以机器人为仆人)，或破坏真实社会关系的真实性。尤其是父母，可能会对人格化机器人对孩子的影响表示担忧。这一前瞻性研究和设计项目的结果将为最恰当地应对这些关切提供指导，并将确立确保机器人只为人类造福的原则。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009(Public Law 111-5). This project will investigate people's social and moral relationships with personified robots. These robots, in various ways and to varying degrees, embody aspects of people insofar as they have a persona, are adaptive and autonomous, and can talk, learn, use natural cues, and self organize. This project will complete five complementary investigations: (1) Research on whether adults believe that a humanoid robot has feelings, is intelligent, can be a friend, is autonomous, and has moral standing (i.e., can be the recipient of unfair actions and unwarranted psychological harm). (2) A study of the extent to which children, adolescents, and adults believe that a robot can be responsible for harm it causes humans. (3) A study of moral standing and accountability that examines whether children, adolescents, and adults consider a humanoid robot most like a human, child, animal, or object - or as a new technological genre. (4) Research on whether children, adolescents, and adults believe that a robot is an entity that engenders trust and can be trusted. (5) A design study of patterns for sociality in human-robot interaction that characterizes essential features of social interaction between humans and robots. Taken together, this body of work would provide for the first time a systematic account of social and moral behavior and reasoning with a humanoid robot that cuts across childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. In terms of basic science, this project will test the hypothesis that people do not simply act "as if " personified robots are social (like "characters" in a play), but engage personified robots sincerely and meaningfully as social others, and in some ways even as moral others. At the same time, this project would determine the extent to which human-robot interaction is not simply the mapping of human-human interactions (or human-animal interactions) onto robots, but represents a new genre: technological yet animate, personified, responsive, and seemingly autonomous.As personified robots become more prevalent and integrated into people's everyday social lives, they will pose children and adults with significant challenges, socially and morally. The specific challenges will depend on how the robots are designed, their context of use, and on how people actually interact with such robots. In future, robots may become caretaking assistants for the elderly, academic tutors for children, or medical assistants, day care assistants, or psychological counselors. Thus, it is important to understand at the outset how different age groups respond to robots and conceptualize their increasingly complex behavior. It is likely in the near future that the public will raise serious concerns about the introduction of personified robots into society. Concerns may be voiced, for example, that interacting with personified robots will reify a master-servant relationship (with the robot as servant), or undermine authenticity of real social relationships. Parents, in particular, may voice concerns about the impacts of personified robots on their children. The results of this proactive research and design project will provide guidance in responding most appropriately to such concerns and will establish principles for assuring that robots will be used only for human benefit.