Volume 17, Issue 3
GBP
Buy:£15.00 + Taxes

Abstract

We found that children sometimes abused a social robot placed in a shopping mall hallway. They verbally abused the robot, repeatedly obstructed its path, and sometimes even kicked and punched the robot. To investigate the reasons for the abuse, we conducted a field study in which we interviewed visiting children who exhibited serious abusive behaviors, including physical contact. We analyzed interview contents to determine whether the children perceived the robot as human-like, why they abused it, and whether they thought that the robot would suffer from their abusive behavior. We obtained valid interviews from 23 children (age range, 5–9 years old) over 13 days of observations. We found that 1) the majority of the children engaged in abuse because they were curious about the robot’s reactions or enjoyed abusing it and considered it human-like, and 2) about half of them believed the robot was capable of perceiving their abusive behaviors.

Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1075/is.17.3.02nom
2017-03-16
2024-03-28
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Arluke, A.
    (2002) Animal Abuse as Dirty Play. Symbolic Interaction, 25: 405–430. doi: 10.1525/si.2002.25.4.405
    https://doi.org/10.1525/si.2002.25.4.405 [Google Scholar]
  2. Bartneck, C. , & Hu, J.
    (2008) Exploring the abuse of robots. Interaction Studies, 9: 415–433. doi: 10.1075/is.9.3.04bar
    https://doi.org/10.1075/is.9.3.04bar [Google Scholar]
  3. Beran, T. N. , Ramirez-Serrano, A. , Kuzyk, R. , Fior, M. , & Nugent, S.
    (2011) Understanding how children understand robots: Perceived animism in child – robot interaction. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 69: 539–550. doi: 10.1016/j.ijhcs.2011.04.003
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2011.04.003 [Google Scholar]
  4. Brahnam, S. , & De Angeli, A.
    (2008) Special issue on the abuse and misuse of social agents. Interacting with Computers, 20: 287–291. doi: 10.1016/j.intcom.2008.02.001
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intcom.2008.02.001 [Google Scholar]
  5. Brscic, D. , Kidokoro, H. , Suehiro, Y. , & Kanda, T.
    (2015) Escaping from Children’s Abuse of Social Robots. In: Proceedings of ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI2015), pp.59–66.
    [Google Scholar]
  6. Bryant, B. K.
    (1990) Mental health, temperament, family, and friends: perspectives on children’s empathy and social perspective taking. In: Empathy and its development ( Eisenberg, N. , & Straye, J. (Eds)), pp.245–270.
    [Google Scholar]
  7. Burgard, W. , Cremers, A. B. , Fox, D. , Hähnel, D. , Lakemeyer, G. , Schulz, D. , Steiner, W. , & Thrun, S.
    (1998) The Interactive Museum Tour-Guide Robot. In: Proceedings of the Fifteenth National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pp.11–18.
    [Google Scholar]
  8. Creed, C. , & Beale, R.
    (2006) Agent Abuse: The Potential Dangers of Socially Intelligent Embodied Agents. In: Proceedings of Workshop on Misuse and Abuse of Interactive Technologies.
    [Google Scholar]
  9. Dryden, W. , & Branch, R.
    (Eds.) (2012) The CBT Handbook. Sage.
    [Google Scholar]
  10. Endresen, I. M. , & Olweus, D.
    (2001) Self-reported empathy in Norwegian adolescents: Sex differences, age trends, and relationship to bullying. In: Constructive & destructive behavior: Implications for family, school, & society ( Bohart, A. C. & Stipek, D. J. (Eds)), pp.147–165.
    [Google Scholar]
  11. Friedman, B. , Kahn, P. H. , Hagman, J.
    (2003) Hardware companions? – What online AIBO discussion forums reveal about the human-robotic relationship. In: CHI 2003 Proceedings (long paper), pp.273–280.
    [Google Scholar]
  12. Gini, G. , Albiero, P. , Benelli, B. , & Altoè, G.
    (2007) Does empathy predict adolescents’ bullying and defending behavior?Aggressive behavior, 33: 467–476. doi: 10.1002/ab.20204
    https://doi.org/10.1002/ab.20204 [Google Scholar]
  13. Gross, H.-M. , Boehme, H. , Schroeter, C. , Mueller, S. , Koenig, A. , Einhorn, E. , Martin, C. , Merten, M. , & Bley, A.
    (2009) Toomas: Interactive Shopping Guide Robots in Everyday Use – Final Implementation and Experiences from Long-Term Field Trials. In: Proceedings of IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp.2005–2012.
    [Google Scholar]
  14. Han, J. , Jo, M. , Park, S. , & Kim, S.
    (2005) The Educational Use of Home Robots for Children. In: Proceedings of IEEE International Workshop on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, pp.378–383.
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Kahn, P. H. , Kanda, T. , Ishiguro, H. , Freier, N. G. , Severson, R. L , Gill, B. T. , Ruckert, J. H. , & Shen, S.
    (2012a) “Robovie, You’ll Have to Go into the Closet Now”: Children’s Social and Moral Relationships with a Humanoid Robot. Developmental Psychology, 48: 303–314. doi: 10.1037/a0027033
    https://doi.org/10.1037/a0027033 [Google Scholar]
  16. Kahn, P. H. , Kanda, T. , Ishiguro, H. , Gill, B. T. , Ruckert, J. H. , Shen, S. , Gary, H. E. , Reichert, A. L. , Freier, N. G. , & Severson, R. L.
    (2012b) Do People Hold a Humanoid Robot Morally Accountable for the Harm It Causes?In: Proceedings of ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, pp.33–40.
    [Google Scholar]
  17. Kahn, P. H. , Reichert, A. L. , Gary, H. E. , Kanda, T. , Ishiguro, H. , Shen, S. , Ruckert, J. H. , & Gill, B. T.
    (2011) The New Ontological Category Hypothesis in Human-Robot Interaction. In: Proceedings of ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, pp.159–160.
    [Google Scholar]
  18. Kanda, T. , Hirano, T. , Eaton, D. , & Ishiguro, H.
    (2004) Interactive robots as social partners and peer tutors for children: a field trial. Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, 19: 61–84. doi: 10.1207/s15327051hci1901&2_4
    https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327051hci1901&2_4 [Google Scholar]
  19. Kawakita, J.
    (1967) A Way of Thinking for Creativity. Chuo-Shinsho (in Japanese).
    [Google Scholar]
  20. Larkin, S.
    (2009) >Metacognition in Young Children> , Routledge.
    [Google Scholar]
  21. Lennon, R. , & Eisenberg, N.
    (1987) Gender and age differences in empathy and sympathy. In: Empathy and its development ( Eisenberg, N , & Strayer, J. (Eds)), pp.195–217.
    [Google Scholar]
  22. Riek, L. D. , Rabinowitch, T-C. , Chakrabarti, B. , & Robinson, P.
    (2009) How anthropomorphism affects empathy toward robots. In: Proceedings of ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, pp.245–246.
    [Google Scholar]
  23. Ros, R. , Nalin, M. , Wood, R. , Baxter, P. , Looije, R. , Demiris, Y. , Belpaeme, T. , Giusti, A. , & Pozzi, C.
    (2011) Child-robot interaction in the wild: advice to the aspiring experimenter. In: Proceedings of 13th international conference on multimodal interfaces, pp.335–342.
    [Google Scholar]
  24. Rosenthal-von der Pütten, A. M. , Schulte, F. P. , Eimler, S. C. , Sobieraj, S. , Hoffmann, L. , Maderwald, S. , Brand, M. , & Krämer, N. C.
    (2014) Investigations on empathy towards humans and robots using fMRI. Computers in Human Behavior, 33: 201–212. doi: 10.1016/j.chb.2014.01.004
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2014.01.004 [Google Scholar]
  25. Salvini, P. , Ciaravella, G. , Yu, W. , Ferri, G. , Manzi, A. , Mazzolai, B. , Laschi, C. , Oh, S.R. , & Dario, P.
    (2010) How safe are service robots in urban environments? Bullying a Robot. In: Proceedings of IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, pp.1–7. doi: 10.1109/ROMAN.2010.5654677
    https://doi.org/10.1109/ROMAN.2010.5654677 [Google Scholar]
  26. Scupin, R.
    (1997) The KJ Method: A Technique for Analyzing Data Derived from Japanese Ethnology. Human Organization, 56: 233–237. doi: 10.17730/humo.56.2.x335923511444655
    https://doi.org/10.17730/humo.56.2.x335923511444655 [Google Scholar]
  27. Strohmeier, D.
    (2014) Bullying and its Underlying Mechanisms. Education.com, www.education.com/reference/article/reasons-for-bullying/
  28. Tanaka, F. , Movellan, J. R. , Fortenberry, B. , & Aisaka, K.
    (2006) Daily HRI evaluation at a classroom environment: reports from dance interaction experiments. In: Proceedings of International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, pp.3–9.
    [Google Scholar]
  29. Tani, F. , Greenman, P. G. , Schneider, B. H. , & Fregoso, M.
    (2003) Bullying and the Big Five: A Study of Childhood Personality and Participant Roles in Bullying Incidents. School Psychology International, 24: 131–146. doi: 10.1177/0143034303024002001
    https://doi.org/10.1177/0143034303024002001 [Google Scholar]
http://instance.metastore.ingenta.com/content/journals/10.1075/is.17.3.02nom
Loading
/content/journals/10.1075/is.17.3.02nom
Loading

Data & Media loading...

Keyword(s): abusive behavior; children; Communication robot; semi-structured interview

Most Cited