Periodic Reporting for period 4 - SOCIAL ROBOTS (Mechanisms and Consequences of Attributing Socialness to Artificial Agents)
Berichtszeitraum: 2021-04-01 bis 2023-03-31
Understanding how we perceive and interact with others is a core challenge for social cognition research. This challenge is poised to intensify as the importance of artificial intelligence, and the presence of humanoid robots in society, grows. Through an innovative combination of psychology, neuroscience and robotics, the SOCIAL ROBOTS project prepares us for this future by (1) establishing a new approach for understanding how the brain processes and responds to humanoid robots; and (2) using this approach to delineate factors influencing how flexibly representations of robots and humans are shared at brain and behavioral levels. To achieve this, we first establish how young adults perceive and interact with humans vs. robots, the role of physical features and training experience, and the extent to which brain regions mediating social interaction with humans also support robot interaction. Next, to test the role of experience-dependent plasticity on social cognition, we assess how cognitive flexibility toward robots manifests among young children and older adults. Finally, we explore cultural influences on shared representations of humans and robots by extending the first project phase to Japan, the world’s most robotics-rich nation. Findings will provide a detailed and nuanced understanding of how brain mechanisms supporting social engagement with people are used when interacting with robots, and how different kinds of experience (e.g. training, lifespan, cultural) influence this engagement. The planned experiments and those generated during the project will establish the research team as a world-leading group bridging social cognition, neuroscience and robotics.
The project ran for 78 months (6.5 years). During that time, the team contended with the entirety of the acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic (and the resulting lockdowns and research pauses), as well as the PI taking two periods of maternity leave. Despite some of the challenges introduced to the planned research program due to these disruptions, the team nonetheless accomplished most of the core aims set out in the Description of Action, with the exception of completing all the developmental studies planned (due to testing restrictions taking longer to lift for developmental populations, especially for brain imaging), and all of the cross-cultural studies (due to Japan's borders remaining closed even for citizens to travel into the country until less than 1 year before the project's finish).
With that being said, significant progress was made to the project goals with the first research stream being completed in its entirety, and the second and third research streams being completed nearly in their entirety. As such, our findings have yielded rich and methodologically-rigorous insights into how young adults, children and older adults perceive and interact with social robots, using brain imaging, behavioural and training measures, and the extent to which perceptions of and interactions with social robots are influenced by cultural background (Scottish vs. Japanese). From start to finish, we have focused on embracing Open Science methods, having preregistered each of our empirical studies, and shared all data, code, and materials for most of our studies (and all in this last and final reporting period). In addition, we devised and presented public engagement events based on the objectives of the project, ensuring individuals beyond academia are invested in and benefit from the research undertaken.
In total, the team produced 21 publications and 25 invited conference talks for the PI alone, as well as organised a multidisciplinary workshop on the social neurocognition of human robot interaction (Bangor University, August 2017) and a symposium on a similar topic at the 2018 HRI meeting in Chicago, USA. Moreover, two team members (Cross and Hortensius) served as co-editors of a theme issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B along with fellow ERC awardee, Agnieszka Wykowska, titled ‘From social brains to social robots: Applying neurocognitive insights to human-robot interaction’, published in 2019.
With that being said, significant progress was made to the project goals with the first research stream being completed in its entirety, and the second and third research streams being completed nearly in their entirety. As such, our findings have yielded rich and methodologically-rigorous insights into how young adults, children and older adults perceive and interact with social robots, using brain imaging, behavioural and training measures, and the extent to which perceptions of and interactions with social robots are influenced by cultural background (Scottish vs. Japanese). From start to finish, we have focused on embracing Open Science methods, having preregistered each of our empirical studies, and shared all data, code, and materials for most of our studies (and all in this last and final reporting period). In addition, we devised and presented public engagement events based on the objectives of the project, ensuring individuals beyond academia are invested in and benefit from the research undertaken.
In total, the team produced 21 publications and 25 invited conference talks for the PI alone, as well as organised a multidisciplinary workshop on the social neurocognition of human robot interaction (Bangor University, August 2017) and a symposium on a similar topic at the 2018 HRI meeting in Chicago, USA. Moreover, two team members (Cross and Hortensius) served as co-editors of a theme issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B along with fellow ERC awardee, Agnieszka Wykowska, titled ‘From social brains to social robots: Applying neurocognitive insights to human-robot interaction’, published in 2019.
Our project generated exciting new insights into the longer-term impacts of human social interaction with robots, primarily from neuroscience perspectives. Our studies have been the first to use representational similarity methods (MVPA) to examine the extent to which humans might perceive artificial agents as social agents/companions (Hortensius and Cross, in prep; Cross et al., 2019).
The project has achieved a high level of public engagement too. Our ‘Popularity Contest at the Robotic Petting Zoo’ project was featured on the BBC and other news websites, as well as BBC Radio Wales, and in the first instalment of this interactive event, we attracted nearly 1000 visitors of all ages and backgrounds to take part over a 1-week period (December 2017). Since then, we have run the event at the Glasgow Science Festival and the British Science Festival, attracting several thousand more participants. In addition, the SOCIAL ROBOTS project was featured in the ERCcomic You, Robot, published in 2018 (see https://www.erccomics.com/comics/you-robot)
In addition, eight team members maintained active twitter accounts throughout the duration of the project, with frequent tweeting of #TeamSoBots project updates. Our active project website featured research updates and papers and presentations prepared by team members and students as part of our social robotics journal club (www.so-bots.com) and we also developed a dedicated website for the robotic petting zoo outreach project (www.roboticpettingzoo.com). We curate an active Open Science Framework account, where we share our research materials and data with the general public (as well as other academic users) in an aim to foster the transparency and reproducibility of our team’s research. We estimate that our dissemination and communication activities have reached ~9,000 members of the general public.
During the first half of the project, we developed careful and thorough foundational work that we sought to build upon during the second half of the project. Unfortunately, we failed to meet all of our (ambitious) targets for this second half of the research due to pandemic-related challenges, but we nonetheless accomplished more (on balance) than we set out to when the proposal was originally written in late 2014/early 2015. In sum, this project has enriched and deepened our understanding of developmental, aging and cross-cultural neurocognitive perspectives on human--robot interaction.
The project has achieved a high level of public engagement too. Our ‘Popularity Contest at the Robotic Petting Zoo’ project was featured on the BBC and other news websites, as well as BBC Radio Wales, and in the first instalment of this interactive event, we attracted nearly 1000 visitors of all ages and backgrounds to take part over a 1-week period (December 2017). Since then, we have run the event at the Glasgow Science Festival and the British Science Festival, attracting several thousand more participants. In addition, the SOCIAL ROBOTS project was featured in the ERCcomic You, Robot, published in 2018 (see https://www.erccomics.com/comics/you-robot)
In addition, eight team members maintained active twitter accounts throughout the duration of the project, with frequent tweeting of #TeamSoBots project updates. Our active project website featured research updates and papers and presentations prepared by team members and students as part of our social robotics journal club (www.so-bots.com) and we also developed a dedicated website for the robotic petting zoo outreach project (www.roboticpettingzoo.com). We curate an active Open Science Framework account, where we share our research materials and data with the general public (as well as other academic users) in an aim to foster the transparency and reproducibility of our team’s research. We estimate that our dissemination and communication activities have reached ~9,000 members of the general public.
During the first half of the project, we developed careful and thorough foundational work that we sought to build upon during the second half of the project. Unfortunately, we failed to meet all of our (ambitious) targets for this second half of the research due to pandemic-related challenges, but we nonetheless accomplished more (on balance) than we set out to when the proposal was originally written in late 2014/early 2015. In sum, this project has enriched and deepened our understanding of developmental, aging and cross-cultural neurocognitive perspectives on human--robot interaction.