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

Abstract

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.

Healthcare Digitalisation and the Changing Nature of Work and Society

“…First, there is a possibility that technological change leads to a change in how care is both perceived and delivered. While some have previously conceived care as something restricted to human-human relations, this might change, and our accompanying ideas of what constitutes quality care (refer to Figure 1 above) could simultaneously change [62]. Danaher [68] provides the foundation of such research in a recent article examining axiological futurism, in which value change as a result of technological change.…”

“…One framework for analysing quality of care consists of three categories: structure, process, and outcome [61]. Resources are here considered as a part of structure, but in order to better illustrate the distinction between quality and quantity of care, Saetra [62] proposed rearranging the factors as shown in Figure 1:…”

“…Either way, in order to reduce costs through automation of tasks, humans must necessarily be made more effective-according to the system perspective of Norman [16]-or replaced by the new technology. If we use the example of nursing staff at an eldercare facility for patients with dementia, a social robot might be introduced to allow the caretakers to care for more patients, if the robot is effective in keeping the elderly calm and satisfied, and perhaps even provide them with certain forms of therapy or even physical assistance [62]. In such a situation, we could argue that workers are, from the system perspective, made more effective.…”

“…In such a situation, automation is detrimental to how work is experienced, rather than automation leading to some form of dystopia [3]. [62].…”

The Impact of International Electronic Commerce on Export Trade: Evidence from China

“…Assume that the submission of IEC reduces the fixed costs of international trade enterprises [31][32][33]. For example, IEC facilitates the collection of shared information through the application of Internet technologies, such as email, which reduces communication costs [34]. Define the network connection between countries i and j as x ij (0 < x ij < 1), which is used as a proxy variable for IEC and reflects that the fixed cost of an enterprise is inversely proportional to the amount of information obtained [35].…”