Individual differences in attitude toward robots predict behavior in human-robot interaction

Humans are influenced by the presence of other social agents, sometimes performing better, sometimes performing worse than alone. Humans are also affected by how they perceive the social agent. The present study investigat-ed whether individual differences in the attitude toward robots can predict human behavior in Human-Robot Interaction (HRI). Therefore, adult partic-ipants played a game with the Cozmo robot (Anki Inc., San Francisco), in which their task was to stop a balloon from exploding. In individual trials, only the participants could stop the balloon inflating, while in joint trials al-so Cozmo could stop it. Results showed that in joint trials, the balloon ex-ploded less often than in individual trials. However participants stopped the balloon earlier in joint than in individual trials, although this was less bene-ficial for them. This effect of Cozmo joining the game, nevertheless, was in-fluenced by the negative attitude of the participants toward robots. The more negative they were, the less their behavior was influenced by the presence of the robot. This suggests that robots can influence human behavior, although this influence is modulated by the attitude toward the robot.