Bridging the Mechanical and the Human Mind: Spontaneous Mimicry of a Physically Present Android

Abstract

The spontaneous mimicry of others' emotional facial expressions constitutes a rudimentary form of empathy and facilitates social understanding. Here, we show that human participants spontaneously match facial expressions of an android physically present in the room with them. This mimicry occurs even though these participants find the android unsettling and are fully aware that it lacks intentionality. Interestingly, a video of that same android elicits weaker mimicry reactions, occurring only in participants who find the android “humanlike.” These findings suggest that spontaneous mimicry depends on the salience of humanlike features highlighted by face-to-face contact, emphasizing the role of presence in human-robot interaction. Further, the findings suggest that mimicry of androids can dissociate from knowledge of artificiality and experienced emotional unease. These findings have implications for theoretical debates about the mechanisms of imitation. They also inform creation of future robots that effectively build rapport and engagement with their human users.

The neuroethology of spontaneous mimicry and emotional contagion in human and non-human animals

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The Mimicry Among Us: Intra- and Inter-Personal Mechanisms of Spontaneous Mimicry

“…To further understand the features controlling spontaneous mimicry, we examined spontaneous responses to expressions of anger and joy generated by a human and an android (Hofree et al 2014). The human and android expressions were very similar in appearance and temporal dynamics (for details see Wu et al 2009).…”

From automata to animate beings: the scope and limits of attributing socialness to artificial agents

“…In addition, people also recognize physically present robots’ emotions more accurately, and even report higher levels of empathy for robots with whom they share the same space . A recent study showed that the presence of an android robot directly influences perceived humanness and spontaneous mimicry by participants . First, participants rated the android higher on human‐likeness when it was collocated with them, compared to being presented on a computer screen.…”