ISSN 0439-755X
CN 11-1911/B
主办:中国心理学会
   中国科学院心理研究所
出版:科学出版社

心理学报 ›› 2024, Vol. 56 ›› Issue (2): 146-160.doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1041.2024.00146

• “数智时代的道德伦理”特刊 • 上一篇    下一篇

多元文化经历提升人类对机器人的利他行为及心智知觉的中介作用

滕玥1,2,#, 张昊天3,#, 赵偲琪1,2, 彭凯平4, 胡晓檬1,2()   

  1. 1.中国人民大学心理学系, 北京 100872
    2.中国人民大学哲学与认知科学跨学科交叉平台, 北京 100872
    3.武汉大学哲学学院心理学系, 武汉 430072
    4.清华大学心理学系, 北京 100084
  • 收稿日期:2022-09-04 发布日期:2023-12-01 出版日期:2024-02-25
  • 通讯作者: 胡晓檬, E-mail:xiaomenghu@ruc.edu.cn
  • 作者简介:

    #滕玥和张昊天为本文的共同第一作者

    *中国人民大学“双一流”跨学科重大创新规划平台支持。

Multicultural experiences enhance human altruism toward robots and the mediating role of mind perception

TENG Yue1,2,#, ZHANG Haotian3,#, ZHAO Siqi1,2, PENG Kaiping4, HU Xiaomeng1,2()   

  1. 1. Department of Psychology, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China
    2. Major Innovation & Planning Interdisciplinary Platform for the “Double-First Class” Initiative, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China
    3. Department of Psychology, School of Philosophy, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
    4. Department of Psychology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
  • Received:2022-09-04 Online:2023-12-01 Published:2024-02-25

摘要:

人类步入人工智能时代, 人工智能快速迭代、迅猛发展、不断变革, 引发诸多伦理问题。其中一个核心关切便是在人类与AI和谐共生的指导思想之下, 人类是否会对机器人持有与人类同等的道德关怀并对其做出利他行为。目前, 鲜有研究探讨哪些文化心理因素提高人类对机器人的利他行为及其背后的深层心理机制。本研究旨在从多元文化经历的视角开展科学探索。基于中西两种文化样本的研究发现, 个体的多元文化经历正向预测人类对机器人的利他行为, 人对机器人的心智感知起部分中介作用。此中介模型在中西文化被试中不存在显著文化差异, 表明该模型具备一定的文化普适性。最后, 线上启动实验研究虽未能证实因果机制, 但存在符合研究假设的总体趋势。本研究丰富了多元文化经历的下游效应, 对探讨何种前因变量会提高人类对机器人的利他行为及其解释机制做出了一定的原创贡献。

关键词: 多元文化经历, 人机交互, 利他行为, 心智知觉, 文化普适

Abstract:

Artificial intelligence is developing rapidly, and the future of human beings is closely related to it. The question of how humans and robots can better work together has become a pressing concern for social psychologists. Human-robot interaction is a two-way process, and research has explored how robots can better serve humans. Whether humans share the same moral concern or even act altruistically toward robots is critical, as it will feed into technological advances and the stability of human society. Few studies have examined which cultural and psychological factors shape people's willingness and behavior to accord robots moral status, i.e., whether they are believed to deserve the same rights and benefits as humans and to perform more altruistic acts toward them. Through two sub-studies and a causal study, the present work seeks to explore whether individuals' multicultural experiences enhance altruistic behavior toward robots and whether human mental perceptions of robots play a mediating role.

Study 1a began with a cross-sectional study in which 217 valid participants with an average age of 25.64 years were collected in China through the Questionnaire Star platform to measure their multicultural experiences, altruistic behavior toward robots, mind perceptions, and demographic information. To verify the model's cross-cultural generalizability that multicultural experiences enhance altruistic behavior toward robots, Study 1b replicated the procedure of Study 1a on Mturk with 313 valid participants (mean age 33.94 years) using the English version of the questionnaire from Study 1a. Finally, to infer the causal relationship between multicultural experiences and altruistic behavior toward robots, Study 2 recruited Chinese participants with six months or more of overseas experiences to prime participants' multicultural experiences through reading and writing tasks. A total of 249 valid data were collected in Study 2, with a mean age of 25.96 years, and participants were randomly divided into a multicultural experience priming group, hometown experience priming group, and control group. After priming, participants were asked to fill out the manipulation check scale, the Mind Perception Scale, and the Altruistic Behavior Toward Robots Questionnaire, with the order of the three measures presented randomly. Finally, participants reported their information on a number of demographic variables.

Study 1a found that individuals' multicultural experiences positively predicted altruistic behavior toward robots, with mind perceptions playing a partially mediating role. Study 1b found that this mediating chain was cross-culturally consistent across Chinese and Western participants, with no Chinese or Western cultural differences. We infer that this effect has some degree of cultural generalizability. Study 2 found that multicultural experiences were manipulated successfully, but the main effect of multicultural experiences on altruistic behavior toward robots did not reach significance.

The current work reveals that individuals’ multicultural experiences increase altruistic behavior toward robots. Specifically, the richer an individual's multicultural experiences, the more likely they are to perceive the robots as possessing mental perception. Thus, they are more likely to trigger altruistic behavior toward robots. At the same time, this effect is to some extent cross-culturally generalizable. The results of our studies enrich the theoretical predictions of multicultural experiences, identify possible “downstream effects” of multicultural experiences, and make an original contribution to the study of what factors enhance human altruistic behavior toward robots.

Key words: multicultural experiences, human-computer interaction, altruistic behavior, mind perception, cultural universality

中图分类号: