Embodiment matters: toward culture-specific robotized counselling

Abstract

In this paper, we propose adding the traditional Japanese nodding behavior to the repertoire of social movements to be used in the context of humanrobot interaction. Our approach is motivated by the notion that in many cultures, trust-building can be boosted by small body gestures. We discuss the integration of a robot capable of such movements within CRECA, our context-respectful counseling agent. The frequent nodding called "unazuki" in Japan, often accompanying the "un-un" sound (meaning "I agree") of Japanese onomatopoeia, underlines empathy and embodies unconditioned approval. We argue that "unazuki" creates more empathy and promotes longer conversation between the robotic counsellor and people. We set up an experiment involving 10 subjects to verify these effects. Our quantitative evaluation is based on the classic metrics of utterance, adapted to support the Japanese language. Interactions featuring "unazuki" showed higher value of this metrics. Moreover, subjects assessed the counselling robot's trustworthiness and kindness as "very high" (Likert scale: 5.5 versus 3 -4.5) showing the effect of social gestures in promoting empathetic dialogue to general people including the younger generation. Our findings support the importance of social movements when using robotized agents as a therapeutic tool aimed at improving emotional state and social interactions, with unambiguous evidence that embodiment can have a positive impact that warrants further exploration. The 3D printable design of our robot supports creating culture-specific libraries of social movements, adapting the gestural repertoire to different human cultures.

Can robots recover a service using interactional justice as employees do? A literature review-based assessment

“…Several works showed that ServBots could appear courteous and engaging (IJ dimension: politeness ) through their capacity to dialogue and display identifiable human emotions (Kharub et al 2021 ; Rincon et al 2019 ). ServBots can deliver an empathic speech and voice (James et al 2020 ), understand jokes (Fung et al 2016 ), and display small social behaviors like nodding (Sakurai et al 2020 ) to increase customers' perception of ServBots' social agency, sincerity, and engagement. Servbots can also appear honest and trustful (IJ dimension: respect ) through human-like features (Cominelli et al 2021 ; Roesler et al 2021 ), cute faces (Pinney et al 2022 ), extroverted voice pitch (Niculescu et al 2013 ), and small social behaviors (Sakurai et al 2020 ).…”

“…ServBots can deliver an empathic speech and voice (James et al 2020 ), understand jokes (Fung et al 2016 ), and display small social behaviors like nodding (Sakurai et al 2020 ) to increase customers' perception of ServBots' social agency, sincerity, and engagement. Servbots can also appear honest and trustful (IJ dimension: respect ) through human-like features (Cominelli et al 2021 ; Roesler et al 2021 ), cute faces (Pinney et al 2022 ), extroverted voice pitch (Niculescu et al 2013 ), and small social behaviors (Sakurai et al 2020 ). ServBots' capacity to display emotional expressions also increases customers' perception of trustfulness (Acosta-Mitjans et al 2019 ).…”

“…ServBots are also able to accept blame (Kerruish 2021 ) (IJ dimension: apology ) and provide explanations, feedback, and information (Kerruish 2021 ; Leite et al 2013a , b ), and recommend activities (Rincon et al 2019 ) with high scores in social presence and sociability (Rossi et al 2020 ) (IJ dimension: explanation ). Finally, ServBots can show helpfulness, attention, and listening skills (IJ dimension: interest ) through facial expressions (Pasternak et al 2021 ), social behaviors (Rossi et al 2020 ; Sakurai et al 2020 ), empathic display (Bagheri et al 2021 ; Kuhnlenz et al 2013 ), and high social presence (Leite et al 2014 ). These findings show that ServBots' emotional and social skills to handle interactions during service encounters go beyond customers' concerns and negative perceptions of ServBots, as reported in Table 1 .…”

Counseling (ro)bot as a use case for 5G/6G

“…CRECA uses not only ELIZA-style mirroring but also generates its own responses for digging [ 5 ]. Furthermore, it periodically attempts to summarize the clients’ previous utterances considering their emotional impact and chronological order.…”

“… AI counseling agent called VICA (VIsual Counseling Agent) [ 4 ]. Robot (version of) VICA, namely, VICA’s IoT (Internet of Things oriented robot [ 5 ]). These agent systems help mentally distressed or anxious persons by conversation or interchanges.…”