Can empathy affect the attribution of mental states to robots?

TL;DR

This study demonstrates that humanoid robots can evoke empathy in humans, which in turn increases the attribution of mental states and emotional intelligence to the robot, highlighting the influence of empathy on human-robot interactions.

Contribution

It provides experimental evidence that empathy towards a robot enhances the attribution of mental states and emotional intelligence, a novel insight into human-robot social dynamics.

Findings

Participants showed increased empathy towards NAO when it expressed fear.

Higher scores in mental state attribution were observed in the empathy condition.

Empathy towards robots correlates with increased attribution of mental states.

Abstract

This paper presents an experimental study showing that the humanoid robot NAO, in a condition already validated with regards to its capacity to trigger situational empathy in humans, is able to stimulate the attribution of mental states towards itself. Indeed, results show that participants not only experienced empathy towards NAO, when the robot was afraid of losing its memory due to a malfunction, but they also attributed higher scores to the robot emotional intelligence in the Attribution of Mental State Questionnaire, in comparison with the users in the control condition. This result suggests a possible correlation between empathy toward the robot and humans' attribution of mental states to it.