How game-play with robots can bring out their human side

The more we interact with robots, the more human we perceive them to become – according to new research from the University of East Anglia.

It may sound like a scene from Blade Runner, but psychologists have been investigating exactly what makes robot interactions feel more human.

A new paper published today reveals that playing games with robots to ‘break the ice’ can help bring out their human side.

The research team say that the implications are significant for the future of robotics.

As robots take on roles from care-giving to customer service, designing interactions that promote social engagement could make them more acceptable to humans.

Lead researcher Dr Natalie Wyer, from UEA’s School of Psychology, said: “Robots and AI are fast becoming fixtures in homes, hospitals, and workplaces.

“We wanted to better understand whether people can interact with robots in the same way as they would with other humans. And whether we could ever come to see them as more than just pieces of metal, computer chips, and wires.”

The research team set up a series of experiments with a box-shaped robot called Cozmo.

More than 100 participants interacted with Cozmo – with half of the study group encouraged to play a social game with it first.

The team found that the participants who had previously played a game with Cozmo went on to consider the robot as more human-like.

By contrast - those who interacted with the robot purely mechanically did not.

Dr Wyer said: “We found that when people interact socially with a robot, they begin to perceive its actions more like they would those of a human.

“One key aspect of this is that whilst people are generally accurate at judging the timing of events, they make systematic errors when those events are triggered by human action. We found that participants made the same types of errors in relation to Cozmo’s actions – but only if they’d first played a game that made Cozmo seem like it was ‘thinking’ independently.

“This suggests that context matters. Even our non-humanoid robot Cozmo could be perceived as more human-like and less like a machine or tool after the participants had played a game with it.

“Our study sheds light on a subtle but powerful factor in human-robot relations - the ability to think of them as capable of independent action. Without that, even the most advanced robots may be seen as little more than machines.”

As robots increasingly enter our shared spaces, this research underscores a key takeaway - if we want to coexist with robots as collaborators, we may need to play with them first.

‘Observed Nonhumanoid Robot Actions Induce Vicarious Agency When Perceived as Social Actors, Not as Objects’ is published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology.