The media equation: how people treat computers, television, and new media like real people and places
Silicon sycophants: the effects of computers that flatter
International Journal of Human-Computer Studies
Trust and etiquette in high-criticality automated systems
Communications of the ACM - Human-computer etiquette
Experience as a moderator of the media equation: the impact of flattery and praise
International Journal of Human-Computer Studies
The media equation and team formation: Further evidence for experience as a moderator
International Journal of Human-Computer Studies
Personal and Ubiquitous Computing
Influences on proxemic behaviors in human-robot interaction
IROS'09 Proceedings of the 2009 IEEE/RSJ international conference on Intelligent robots and systems
ICSR'11 Proceedings of the Third international conference on Social Robotics
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Social robots are designed to promote social responses by human users. Based on the Media Equation theory, we argue that the way in which people interact with technology resembles the way in which humans interact with other humans, and, crucially, that these social responses are mainly of an automatic nature. To investigate the automaticity of social behavior towards robots, the current study assessed a well-studied (in human-human interaction) social behavior: interpersonal distance people keep, though not from other humans but from a robot. Earlier research suggested that the social behavior of distance keeping depends (amongst others) on the bodily posture of the interaction partner. Based on these earlier studies, we expected that participants would keep an interpersonal distance dependent on the posture of their robotic interaction partner especially if a participant was responding in more automatic ways. We manipulated robot posture (approachable versus less approachable) and the cognitive load of the participant (high versus low), and measured user-robot approach distance in ten short interaction tasks. In line with expectations, results suggested that especially participants under high cognitive load approached the robot closer when its posture communicated approachableness than when it communicated less approachableness. Thereby, the current results suggested that especially when people are cognitively distracted, their behavior towards robots is of a social nature and comparable to their behavior when responding to other humans. Implications for theory, research and design of social robots are discussed.