Loneliness makes the heart grow fonder (of robots): on the effects of loneliness on psychological anthropomorphism

Abstract

Sociality motivation represents an essential driving force for human behavior and well-being. If the need for affiliation is not satisfied and social interaction partners are unavailable, people might use an alternative strategy: Nonhuman entities, such as pets or religious deities are humanized and turned into social agents. We tested this notion in the context of social robotics and investigated whether activating feelings of loneliness would affect perceptions of anthropomorphism. Results showed that lonely people anthropomorphized the robot FloBi more than participants in the control group. Thus, importantly, users' motivational states need to be considered in the context of human-robot interaction (HRI) as they clearly affect judgments of the robotic interaction partner.