Socially Assistive Robots: Considerations for Negative Effects on Empathy and Emotion Recognition in Human Interaction

Socially assistive robots (SARs) are a recent development in the field of artificial intelligence designed to assist human users through social interactions in vulnerable settings. SARs design has led to significant emotion recognition and empathy research in order to create sufficient and effective userrobot bonds. However, much of this research has focused on the successful emulation of emotion and empathy in robots, rather than the effects of prolonged exposure to such artificial emotion and empathy on subsequent human-to-human empathetic interaction and emotion recognition. In this paper, we present a review of interpersonal empathy in the context of human-robot relationships and discuss the potential consequences of these relationships on human-human social interactions. We also present recommendations for research into this field, drawing from real-life examples of humans bonding to inanimate artificial beings.