Anthropomorphism of robots: Study of appearance and agency

Abstract

Background: As the prevalence of robots increases each year, understanding how we anthropomorphize and interact with them is extremely important. The three-factor theory of anthropomorphism, called the Sociality, Effectance, Elicited agent Knowledge model, guided this study. As anthropomorphism involves a person making attributions of human likeness toward a nonhuman object, this model implies that anthropomorphism can be influenced either by factors related to the person or the object. Objective: The aim of this study was to explore factors influencing the anthropomorphism of robots, specifically the robot’s appearance (humanoid vs nonhumanoid) and agency (autonomous vs nonautonomous). We expected a humanoid robot would be anthropomorphized to a greater extent than one that was nonhumanoid. In addition, we expected that inducing an agency belief to the effect that a robot was making its own decisions would increase anthropomorphism compared with a nonagency belief that the robot was being remotely controlled by a human. We also sought to identify any role gender might play in anthropomorphizing the robot. Methods: Participants (N=99) were primed for agency or nonagency belief conditions and then saw a brief video depicting either a humanoid or nonhumanoid robot interacting with a confederate. After viewing the video, they completed 4 measures: perception to humanoid robots scale (PERNOD), the Epley anthropomorphic adjectives measure, the Fussel anthropomorphic adjective checklist, and the Anthropomorphic Tendencies Scale (ATS). Results: Findings with the PERNOD scale indicated subjects did perceive the 2 robots differently, F6,86=6.59, P