Designing Robots, Designing Humans

Whilst most research concentrates on the imagined future of robotics, this book brings together a group of international researchers to explore the different ways that robots and humans engage with one another at this point in history.

Robotic design is advancing at an incredible pace, and consequently the role of robots has expanded beyond mechanical work in the industrial sector to the social and domestic environment. From kitchen table pets in the shape of dinosaurs or baby seals, to robot arms that assist with eating, to self-driving cars, this book explores the psychological impact of robotic engagement, especially in domestic settings. Each chapter explores a different aspect of humanoid robotics, for example, the relationship between robotics and gender, citizenship, moral agency, ethics, inequality, and psychological development, as well as exploring the growing role of robots in education, care work, and intimate relationships.

Drawing on research from across the fields of psychology, anthropology, and philosophy, this ground-breaking volume discusses the emerging social side of robotics. By examining our relationship with robots now, this book offers a new and innovative opportunity for understanding our future with robots and robotic culture. Designing Robots, Designing Humans will be interest to researchers of artificial intelligence and humanoid robotics, as well as researchers from cognitive and social psychology, philosophy, computer science, anthropology, linguistics, and engineering backgrounds.

Introduction by Dorte Marie Søndergaard & Cathrine Hasse

Chapter 1 - Gotai: Corporeal aesthetics and robotic exoskeletons in Japan by Jennifer Robertson

Chapter 2 - On humanoids, avatars and the rest of us: Gender and designing our new Others by Dorte Marie Søndergaard

Chapter 3 - Performing the kitchen: Becoming a queering witness to the enactments of subject-object relations in a robotic kitchen lab by Pat Treusch

Chapter 4 - The automation of ethics: The case of self-driving cars by Raffaele Rodogno & Marco Nørskov

Chapter 5 - ‘Active citizenship’ and feeding assistive robotics: A crumbling story?

By Niels Christian Mossfeldt Nickelsen

Chapter 6- Drawing the posthuman future? Inequality in children’s conceptual robot imaginaries by Cathrine Hasse

Chapter 7 - Unpacking the cultural baggage of travelling robots: How socially assistive robots are integrated in practice by Lasse Blond & Finn Olesen

Chapter 8 - Robot companions for children and older people: Ethical issues and evidence by Amanda Sharkey, Natalie Wood, & Raihah Aminuddin

Cathrine Hasse, Professor in Anthropology and Learning, Aarhus University, Denmark.

Dorte Marie Søndergaard, Professor in Social Psychology, Aarhus University, Denmark.