Projecting the future impact of advanced technologies: will a robot take my job?

Abstract

Recent years have seen an upsurge of concern in the technical and popular press about the impact of automation upon employment in western societies. Once the concerns about t he development of artificial intelligence were concentrated within the realms of computer science and philosophy, debating the extent to which a robot could be conceived to have self-awareness and consciousness. Those concerns have migrated to the social and business pages where the in creasing advances of automation of jobs and skills are being recognised. The trend has been to point to the downsides of automation and the rise of artificial intelligence. This has moved further from a concern about how lower skilled jobs, such as in mass production of cars and white goods, can be supplemented by robots to a perception that the skills of many profess ions are in line for replacement. This leads in turn to contemplating the impact of automation on the profession of psychology.