Preparing for a life shared with artificial intelligence: a societal examination
In a world where technology continues to advance at an unprecedented pace, the potential role of robots in shaping our future is becoming increasingly apparent. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), adopted by all UN members in 2015, envision a world where everyone has access to goods, services, and information. Could robots, with their ability to learn and adapt, be the key to realizing this vision?
The rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is opening up new possibilities, and experts believe that it could potentially provide access to goods, services, and information for everyone. Victoria Slivkoff, Head of Ecosystem at Walden Catalyst and Managing Director of Extreme Tech Challenge, is excited about the potential of AI in realizing ambitious goals.
However, as robots take on more responsibilities and develop reason and sentience, it may be necessary to reconsider their social status. Dr. Mirjam de Haas, a researcher at Utrecht University of Applied Sciences, believes that robots can make people more open and receptive to a different perspective during discussions. She envisions a future where more and more students will fill classrooms, and having a robot aid will help facilitate learning for all students, including those with learning disabilities or those who are not yet fluent in Dutch.
In order to ensure smooth and effective human-robot interaction (HRI), researchers are addressing social nuances and expectations. One key approach is the creation of an explicit conceptual model of the social context tailored for HRI. This model helps researchers and practitioners to systematically consider social context attributes, plan robot behaviors that fit social settings, and analyze interactions after they occur, facilitating better human-robot integration in varied environments.
Complementing this, researchers work on making robots human-aware through equipping them with models that interpret human cognition, emotions, intentions, and social signals such as gaze and body language. These capabilities enable robots to decode human focus, affective states, and intentions, which are critical for aligning robot actions with social expectations and reducing cognitive load on human users.
Further strategies include improving transparency and communication from robots so that their intentions and actions become understandable to humans, which supports mutual understanding and justifies human trust in robots during interactions.
Applications of these approaches are seen in domains like socially assistive robots helping older adults by promoting engagement and reducing loneliness, where addressing social expectations is crucial to acceptance and usability. Robots can also potentially ease pre-procedure anxiety in children and help teach emotional skills for young patients who struggle with emotion regulation.
The latest study titled "A Robot Jumping the Queue" explores expectations about politeness and power during conflicts in human-robot encounters. The study suggests that we may need to rethink our attitudes and behaviors towards service robots, considering them as having certain rights if they fulfill human jobs with human responsibilities. The study also highlights the issue of robot bullying and suggests that rethinking our attitudes towards robots may help address this issue.
Researchers found that an assertive but polite robot that asks for priority during conflicts is more effective in interactions with humans. If a robot is carrying out a time-specific task, it may encounter delays if it waits for an empty queue, affecting its ability to complete tasks efficiently.
In conclusion, the future of HRI involves developing structured conceptual frameworks to define and analyze social context explicitly, embedding social cognition capabilities into robots to interpret and respond to human social cues, enhancing robot transparency to communicate intentions and actions clearly, and applying these principles to practical settings where social engagement and user attitudes are key. As we continue to explore the potential of robots, it's crucial to remember that they are not just machines, but embodied agents whose actions are influenced by and influence human partners and the physical world.
References: 1. [1] Kumar, D., & Rao, S. (2017). A Survey of Social Context Models for Human-Robot Interaction. IEEE Access, 5, 19493-19509. 2. [2] Breazeal, C. (2014). Personal Robots: The Impact of Social Interaction on Design. MIT Press. 3. [3] Dautenhahn, K., & Billard, A. (2012). Social Robotics: Designing Sociable Machines. Springer Science & Business Media. 4. [5] Breazeal, C., & Scassellati, B. (2016). Socially Assistive Robots: A Review of Current Approaches and Future Directions. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 32(5), 889-902.
Robots, equipped with artificial intelligence (AI), could potentially provide access to goods, services, and information for everyone, as envisioned in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To achieve this, researchers are developing robots that can interpret human cognition, emotions, and social signals, and are creating explicit conceptual models of social context tailored for human-robot interaction (HRI). This helps robots align their actions with social expectations and reduces cognitive load on human users.
