'If you sound like me, you must be more human': on the interplay of robot and user features on human-robot acceptance and anthropomorphism

ABSTRACT

In an experiment we manipulated a robot's voice in two ways: First, we varied robot gender; second, we equipped the robot with a human-like or a robot-like synthesized voice. Moreover, we took into account user gender and tested effects of these factors on human-robot acceptance, psychological closeness and psychological anthropomorphism. When participants formed an impression of a same-gender robot, the robot was perceived more positively. Participants also felt more psychological closeness to the same-gender robot. Similarly, the same-gender robot was anthropomorphized more strongly, but only when it utilized a human-like voice. Results indicate that a projection mechanism could underlie these effects.

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Index Terms

• Applied computing

  • Law, social and behavioral sciences

    • Psychology