Anna Lange: Reading the Mind of a Robot: The Influence of Attitudes towards Robots on Neural Activation in the Theory of Mind Network during a Spoken Interaction

BCCN Berlin / Technische Universität Berlin

Abstract

During social interactions, humans commonly form a mental model of their interaction partner, a process called Theory of Mind (ToM). Previous findings suggest that a brain network underlying this process exists and can be activated by interactions with humans or artificial partners. There are indications that our ability to form a ToM of an artificial agent depends on its perceived sociability. During spoken interaction specifically, we prepare for the social context in which we will speak. In the current experiment, fifty participants played a communicative game with one of three partners (a human, a robot, or a computer). We used fMRI to investigate whether there are consistently different levels of brain activation in the ToM network between partner conditions and whether regions within the ToM network contain relevant information regarding task partners. Further, we address how the participants' fear of artificial intelligence affects these results. Our results demonstrate that the ToM network is consistently more activated during interactions with humans compared to artificial agents, including robots and computers, indicating that we mentalize more during interactions with human partners. Moreover, we successfully decoded the partner's identity from local patterns of brain activity within the ToM network. This means speakers prepare differentially to partners of varying human likeness. Additionally, fear of artificial intelligence may increase activation within the ToM network during interactions with robots and computers. Overall, our findings provide further evidence for the existence of the ToM network, its differential activation based on partner type, and its representation of the partner within its local activation patterns.

 

Additional Information

Master Thesis Defense

 

Organized by

Prof. Dr. John-Dylan Haynes (Charité)   & Asst. Prof. Dr. Doris Pischedda   / Lisa Velenosi