Averting Robot Eyes

Home robots will cause privacy harms. At the same time, they can provide beneficial services—as long as consumers trust them. This Essay evaluates potential technological solutions that could help home robots keep their promises, avert their eyes, and otherwise mitigate privacy harms. Our goals are to inform regulators of robot-related privacy harms and the available technological tools for mitigating them, and to spur technologists to employ existing tools and develop new ones by articulating principles for avoiding privacy harms. We posit that home robots will raise privacy problems of three basic types: (1) data privacy problems; (2) boundary management problems; and (3) social/relational problems. Technological design can ward off, if not fully prevent, a number of these harms. We propose five principles for home robots and privacy design: data minimization, purpose specifications, use limitations, honest anthropomorphism, and dynamic feedback and participation. We review current research into privacy-sensitive robotics, evaluating what technological solutions are feasible and where the harder problems lie. We close by contemplating legal frameworks that might encourage the implementation of such design, while also recognizing the potential costs of regulation at these early stages of the technology

Can robots tackle late-life loneliness? : Scanning of future opportunities and challenges in assisted living facilities

This future-oriented study examines the opportunities and challenges offered by social robots and communication technology when aiming to decrease emotional and social loneliness in older people residing in assisted living (AL). The paper draws on prior literature on loneliness, elder care and social robots. The aim is to scan the futures regarding technology support for the frail older people in future AL. The analytical frame was built on Robert Weiss’ division of relational functions: attachment, social integration, opportunity for nurturance, reassurance of worth, sense of reliable alliance, and guidance in stressful situations, and on a distinction between direct and indirect social robots. Our examinations show that social robots could tackle both emotional and social loneliness in assisted living by empowering people to engage in different forms of social interaction inside and outside the facility. However, ethical concerns of objectification, lack of human contact, and deception need to be thoroughly considered when implementing social robots in care for frail older people.Peer reviewe

Robots in Service and Nursing Care - An Investigation into Japan’s Robot Use and Development

Postponed access: the file will be accessible after 2020-11-30We are currently seeing a rapid growth in the investment and development of robots to assist or replace human workers and efforts in many aspects of life. Due to Japan’s proportionally large and growing elderly population along with a shrinking workforce, the Japanese government has chosen to promote the research, development, and use of robots in fields such as nursing care. Other countries are also facing the same problems as Japan but have not chosen to promote the alternative futuristic solution to the same extent. In a pursuit to better understand the impact that robots already have and will have on society and everyday life, we have researched the topic of assistive robots in the service and nursing care context. Through a design science framework and mixed methods approach, performing semi-structured interviews with robot developers, professors in robotics and nursing care staff, observations on the use of robots in real-life settings, case studies, and one experiment, we have developed a comprehensive analysis and understanding of the research problem. To analyze the data, content analysis and the grounded theory were used. An experiment and two case studies were used to investigate attitudes, perceived benefits, and disadvantages of using robots. Furthermore, interviews and observations were conducted at nursing care facilities to investigate the possibility of assisting or even substituting humans with robots in settings that usually require a sense of human warmth and care. Previous research often focusses on individual robots or on literature review without field data. It would seem like the literature is lacking a deeper perspective, while at the same time, painting a wider picture of the domain itself. Therefore, this research investigated the development and experiences with robots that already exist and have been tested in real-world settings. The findings of the study summarized the literature on robots in nursing care, attitudes towards robots across countries and Japan’s strategy for further integrating robots into their society. Other results include real experience with the use of robots in nursing facilities and theories grounded in the ideas and thoughts behind the development of robots commonly used today. An experiment exploring empathy towards robots demonstrated the distinctiveness of robots, as compared to dolls, in enhanced empathy towards them. Two case studies captured views from university students and primary school pupils based on interaction with the humanoid robot Pepper. Pupils found Pepper to be useful and likable, while university students found the interaction to be fun, but frustrating at times. Based on the field studies, we could conclude that Japanese robot developers and researches recommend robots to be inferior to users in terms of intelligence and relationship, but also capable of easy interaction and ideally reading between lines in communication. In nursing care, robots are currently taking the role of pets (Paro and Qoobo), a child (Pepper, Paro, PALRO, RoBoHon, and Smibi) and even as a staff member (Pepper), capable of entertaining and accompanying elderly to help with mental well-being. There might be a current lack of ethical and safety standards for such robots. However, safety and ethical issues are considered by developers and professors in terms of privacy, deception, attachment, mechanical safety. Current robots have different levels of cognitive capacities depending on purpose and interaction style. Goals for the future include improvement in aspects such as intelligence, marketing strategies, and educating users on robots’ capabilities and limitations.Masteroppgave i informasjonsvitenskapINFO390MASV-IKTMASV-INF

Overcoming barriers and increasing independence: service robots for elderly and disabled people

This paper discusses the potential for service robots to overcome barriers and increase independence of elderly and disabled people. It includes a brief overview of the existing uses of service robots by disabled and elderly people and advances in technology which will make new uses possible and provides suggestions for some of these new applications. The paper also considers the design and other conditions to be met for user acceptance. It also discusses the complementarity of assistive service robots and personal assistance and considers the types of applications and users for which service robots are and are not suitable

Welfare technologies in Finland: An ethico-politics of hype, hope and experimentation

In the past decade, the Finnish government has been eager to enable and support the development, implementation and growing business of automation, robotics and artificial intelligence—that is, welfare technologies in elderly care services. In these visions, technologies offer an intervention to increase health and wellbeing while also being an economic commodity to generate profit. Therefore, expectations towards welfare technologies show politics with high optimism, in which simultaneous expectations of good health, smooth services, a growing economy and a thriving welfare state are fostered. This dissertation delves into a problem in which care politics raise high expectations of technology while catering to the needs of the ageing population. My main research question is as follows: How are the high expectations related to the technology realised in care practices, and what are the ethico-political implications? This dissertation consists of four articles that exemplify the different dimensions of realising these expectations. The dissertation is theoretically based on multiple perspectives from science and technology studies. My theoretical framework enables a focus on ethico-political practices and expectations, offers a symmetrical approach to care and technology and provides a critical viewpoint to the technological promises laid in contemporary care politics. I use multi-sited ethnography as a methodology. The research materials consist of documents, observations and interviews. The focus of the empirical materials is on social robots and telecare technology—that is, robots designed to provide companionship and assistance and surveillance technologies for secure care. I read the different research materials through the sociology of translations, which emphasises that the manner in which expectations are fulfilled concerns the adaptation and transformation of different actors and their aspirations. This dissertation advances the theoretical and empirical understanding of the welfare technology phenomenon. My main argument is that expectations related to welfare technologies in Finland are realised in actual care practices through negotiations between the regimes of hype and hope. The regime of hype captures the health and social policy side of the welfare technology phenomenon, while the regime of hope mainly concerns institutional care. Hype creates, collects and circulates optimistic expectations, while hope enables living with the uncertainty that comes with technology’s material agency. With technology comes the possibility of disruption, which intervenes with care relations and, paradoxically, enables them by offering possibilities for creativity. Experimentation is central to both regimes. While experimentation in the regime of hype aims at fulfilling optimistic expectations, experimentation in the regime of hope is obligatory to secure care. Experimentation in practice makes the wellbeing of individuals and the state commensurate, transforming disappointments into achievements and technological possibilities into necessities. Both regimes value ambivalence and uncertainty due to their shared focus on experimentation.----- Tarkastelen sosiologian alaan kuuluvassa väitöskirjassa iäkkäiden hoivatyöhön suunnattuihin hyvinvointiteknologioihin liittyviä odotuksia sekä niiden eettis-poliittisia vaikutuksia. Väitöskirja koostuu neljästä vertaisarvioidusta tutkimusartikkelista ja yhteenvetoluvusta. Kaksi artikkeleista on julkaistu kansainvälisissä ja kaksi kotimaisissa lehdissä. Tutkimus paikantuu suomalaisen hyvinvointivaltion ja sen hoivapalvelujen murroskohtaan, jossa riittämättömiin hoivaresursseihin haetaan poliittista ratkaisua automaatiosta, tekoälystä ja robotiikasta. Hyvinvointiteknologian käsite viittaa pohjoismaisten hyvinvointivaltioiden pyrkimyksiin vastata ikääntyvän väestön tuomiin haasteisiin teknologisilla innovaatioilla samalla uusia yritysmahdollisuuksia kehittäen ja julkista taloutta eheyttäen. Päätutkimuskysymykseni on: Miten hyvinvointiteknologioihin liittyvät odotukset käytännössä toteutetaan ja millaisin eetis-poliittisin seurauksin? Teoreettisesti tutkimus paikantuu tieteen- ja teknologiantutkimuksen monitieteiseen kenttään. Osallistun erityisesti tutkimusalan keskusteluihin, jotka lähestyvät hoivaa, ikääntymistä ja teknologiaa sekä näihin liittyvää etiikkaa ja politiikkaa käytäntöjen kautta, eivät tee lähtökohtaista erottelua hoivaan liittyvien inhmillisten ja ei-inhimillisten toimijoiden välille sekä mahdollistavat kriittisen tulokulman hyvinvointiteknologiaan kohdistuviin lupauksiin. Metodologisesti tutkimus pohjautuu monipaikkaiseen etnografiaan. Keräämäni aineistot koostuvat dokumenteista, havainnointiaineistosta ja haastatteluista. Lähestyn hyvinvointiteknologian ilmiötä etenkin sosiaalisen robotiikan ja etähoivateknologian kautta. Analysoin aineistoja käännösten sosiologian avulla eli paneutumalla siihen, miten teknologioihin liittyvien lupausten toteutuminen on riippuvaista käännösprosesseista, joissa erilaiset toimijat ja niiden tavoitteet määrittyvät uusiksi. Tutkimus kontribuoi yhteiskuntatieteelliseen hyvinvointiteknologioiden ja iäkkäiden hoivan tutkimukseen tarkastelemalla monipaikkaisesti, miten uusiin teknologioihin liittyvät, eettis-poliittisesti latautuneet ja tulevaisuuteen kohdistuvat, odotukset taipuvat osaksi hoivatyön arkea sitä samalla muuttaen. Tutkimuksessa näytän, miten hyvinvointiteknologiaan liittyvät odotukset toteutuvat käytännössä jännitteisten neuvotteluiden kautta. Väitän, että hyvinvointiteknologiaan liittyvien odotusten toteuttaminen liittyy Suomessa kahteen erilaiseen, hypen ja toivon, regiimiin. Siinä missä hypen regiimi kuvaa hyvinvointiteknologioihin liittyvien suurten odotusten politiikkaa, toivon regiimi havainnollistaa uusien teknologioiden kanssa elettyä hoivan arkea. Molemmat regiimit painottavat kokeellisuutta. Siinä missä hypen regiimissä kokeellisuuden avulla toteutetaan teknologiaan liittyviä lupauksia, toivon regiimissä kokeellisuus on välttämätöntä hyvän hoivan turvaamiseksi. Käytännössä kokeellisuus on keino yhteismitallistaa yksilön ja valtion hyvinvointi, muuttaa pettymykset saavutuksiksi ja teknologiset mahdollisuudet välttämättömyyksiksi. Kokeellisuudesta seuraa, että molemmissa regiimeissä hyödynnetään epävarmuutta resurssina

Aging between Participation and Simulation

This publication aims to initiate an interdisciplinary discourse on the ethical, legal, and social implications of socially assistive technologies in healthcare. It combines practically relevant insights and examples from current research and development with ethical analysis to uncover moral pitfalls at the intersection between the promotion of social participation and well-being, and risks that may diminish the achievement of these ends

On the Margins of the Machine: Heteromation and Robotics

Growing interest in robotics in policy and professional circles promises a future where machines will perform many of the social and institutional functions that have traditionally belonged to human beings. This promise is based on the unexamined premise that robots can act autonomously, without much support from their human users. Close examination of current social robots, however, introduces a different image, where human labor is critically needed for any meaningful operation of these systems. Such labor is normally unacknowledged and made invisible in media and academic portrayals of robotic systems. We take issue with this erasure, and seek to bring human labor to the fore. Drawing on the concept of “heteromation,” we illustrate the indispensible role of human labor in the functioning of many of the existing technological systems. Given current uncertainties in the robotic design space, we explore various scenarios for the future development of these systems, and the different ways by which they might unfold.ye

The foundations of a policy for the use of social robots in care

Should we deploy social robots in care settings? This question, asked from a policy standpoint, requires that we understand the potential benefits and downsides of deploying social robots in care situations. Potential benefits could include increased efficiency, increased welfare, physiological and psychological benefits, and experienced satisfaction. There are, however, important objections to the use of social robots in care. These include the possibility that relations with robots can potentially displace human contact, that these relations could be harmful, that robot care is undignified and disrespectful, and that social robots are deceptive. I propose a framework for evaluating all these arguments in terms of three aspects of care: structure, process, and outcome. I then highlight the main ethical considerations that have to be made in order to untangle the web of pros and cons of social robots in care as these pros and cons are related the trade-offs regarding quantity and quality of care, process and outcome, and objective and subjective outcomes.publishedVersio

Ageing and Technology: Perspectives from the Social Sciences

The booming increase of the senior population has become a social phenomenon and a challenge to our societies, and technological advances have undoubtedly contributed to improve the lives of elderly citizens in numerous aspects. In current debates on technology, however, the "human factor" is often largely ignored. The ageing individual is rather seen as a malfunctioning machine whose deficiencies must be diagnosed or as a set of limitations to be overcome by means of technological devices. This volume aims at focusing on the perspective of human beings deriving from the development and use of technology: this change of perspective - taking the human being and not technology first - may help us to become more sensitive to the ambivalences involved in the interaction between humans and technology, as well as to adapt technologies to the people that created the need for its existence, thus contributing to improve the quality of life of senior citizens