Say hello to Pepper: perceptions and reactions

Who doesn’t have a view on robots? We held an open house event just before Christmas for academics and industry to hear about some of our research projects and to celebrate Christmas and the New Year. As part of this and to promote the project I am working on, I set up a corner of the room to gather views on Pepper as an example of an (albeit narrow) AI. Unsurprisingly, most people had something to say about Pepper…

As people came by I asked their views about the robot and took notes about some of the key themes which emerged from our chats, these are broadly grouped below:

Emotions – people expressed fear, excitement, sadness, intrigue, frustration, isolation, attachment, suspicion. Children did not warm to Pepper. Words like ‘creepy’ and ‘cute’ were used in equal measure!

Appearance and Gender – ‘Pepper is a girl’, ‘Pepper is a little girl, therefore less scary’. ‘Pepper is a male because the name Pepper is masculine’. ‘Pepper seems childlike’. Pepper is ‘cute’, Pepper is ‘adorable’. ‘I prefer a robot that doesn’t look like a human’. ‘Would be worse if it could stand and was on legs’. ‘I don’t like her touching me or moving’. That is ‘creepy’.

Conceptualisation of AI – Pepper is a ‘tangible example of AI. ‘Not what you would normally think of when you think about AI’. ‘Pepper is a PR stunt for AI’.

Functionality – ‘What does it do?’,’Can she hoover?’, ‘Industry should think about the application of AI before it is in use’. ‘What if she makes an error?’, ‘What about the unintended consequences?’

Ethics, bias and trust – ‘Can I trust her?’, ‘Where are the images going when it talks to me?’ I don’t want to look into her eyes – I haven’t given consent’. ‘Just no’.

In many ways, the topics covered here are not particularly surprising but they certainly echo much of what is found in proper research studies and in the literature. This exercise was largely done to promote the project and to hear some views rather than to provide a rigourous account of views on AI, but these initial thoughts and observations will serve as food for thought as I begin to formulate the project’s research questions over the coming weeks. More to come!