How Do People Respond To Being Touched By a Robot?

An anonymous reader writes "You know it's coming, and for the forever-alone crowd, not soon enough: robots that physically interact with humans. Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have found in a study that people generally had a positive response toward being touched by a benevolent robotic nurse, but that their perception of the robot's intent made a significant difference. 'Even though the robot touched people in the same way,' said a team lead, 'if people thought the robot was doing that to clean them, versus doing that to comfort them, it made a significant difference in ... whether they found that contact favorable or not.'"

Comments

Human touch is seen as empathetic

[elrous0]

There is something about a genuine human touch that is seen as empathetic, as an act of kindness. Even if we know it's disingenuous, or that it's part of a person's job, there is still something in the back of our minds that responds to it as a genuine human connection.

Robots, on the other hand, can NEVER be empathetic or kind--and we know this without a doubt. There touch isn't a connection and never can be. That introduces a creep factor that no amount of programming or human emulation can ever fix. Because we know they have no base morality or emotion and are incapable of empathy, robots will always inherently creep people out at best, or scare the shit out of them at worst.

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[Beyond_GoodandEvil]

Time to stock up on some old glory robot insurance

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[Wolvenhaven]

DON'T DATE ROBOTS!

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[mano.m]

I disagree. Empathy and kindness can be programmed, and if sufficiently advanced, may be indistinguishable from human empathy or kindness. What makes my genetic programming or yours more legitimate than that of a future robot? Then again, we may not even need to get there. Humans have a tremendous ability to empathise unilaterally. Spock and R. Daneel Olivaw are two of the most beloved characters in sci-fi. We emotionally connect to pet rocks and the abandoned lamp in the IKEA commercial; we feel for characters in novels and are moved by music. Why not a robot?

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[CharlyFoxtrot]

Robots, on the other hand, can NEVER be empathetic or kind--and we know this without a doubt. There touch isn't a connection and never can be.

How could you possibly know this ? We don't know what kind of advances in AI the future might hold. And besides it's irrelevant, what matters is the human perception of the intent not the intent itself. If we can anthropomorphize animal behavior the way we do we should have no problem kidding ourselves that even a primitive robot is somehow empathetic.

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[ArhcAngel]

Quite right! Marry them and program them to do whatever you want

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[pushing-robot]

How true. I can't enjoy recorded music, because it's simply a cold reproduction from a creepy, unsympathetic machine. Books are the same; who could expect empathy or morality from ink on a page? And don't get me started about video games.

*cough*

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[CharlyFoxtrot]

With robots, you always know it's fake. No matter how good the emulation, that's just always going to be in the back of your mind in dealing with a robot (unless you don't actually know it's a robot).

Tell that to the people convinced their PC hates them ( 93.300.000 results) Humans anthropomorphize *everything*.

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[JackOfAllGeeks]

Humans anthropomorphize *everything*.

This.

My brother attributes a personality and identity to his iPod, I'm sure people will be able to empathize with a robot. The fact that the robot doesn't empathize back is irrelevant -- even in human-to-human interactions, my perception of your intent is far more important than your actual intent, which is recognized in the original comment:

Even if we know it's disingenuous, or that it's part of a person's job, there is still something in the back of our minds that responds to it as a genuine human connection.

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[MorderVonAllem]

Have you seen the videos of http://www.tweenbots.com/ it's a cute little robot and some people go out of their way to help it.

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[gstoddart]

Not even Cameron (Summer Glau), 7 of 9, etc.? :P

Those are both cyborgs.

Provided they don't try to kill you, you're allowed to date them.

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[PaladinAlpha]

What's the difference between fake and genuine empathy? What is genuine empathy?

Re:Human touch is seen as empathetic

[bityz]

The key point in TFA is that the patients projected intent onto the robot. They projected intent onto the robots just as they projected intent onto the nurses, and reacted in the same way regardless of whether it was robot or nurse. The lesson seems to be that you should spend less time programing empathy into a robot, and more time into placing the robot in a context in which intent is implied. By doing so you can trick people into reacting with a robot in a more human way than they might expect.

A few years down the line...

[Wolvenhaven]

Lawyer: "Now little Timmy, on this doll, show me where the robot touched you."

How about robot as agent for compassion?

[PeterM from Berkeley]

Are you sure? I mean, can't a compassionate programmer have programmed the robot to be compassionate to a human for him, by proxy?

I mean, if you see the robot as an agent of a programmer who wants to help you, what's so creepy about that?

--PeterM

Re:How about robot as agent for compassion?

[JackOfAllGeeks]

I bet your girlfriend wouldn't like receiving a love letter that you had bought from "Love Letters Unlimited" and just inserted her name into, would she?

This is why the greeting card industry has been such a failure.

Re:Hmmm...

[Locke2005]

I'm not up to date on the latest cooking trends... does rubbing a hot dog improve it's flavor?