Uncanny Valley Research Articles

THE UNCANNY VALLEY REVISITED: AGE-RELATED DIFFERENCE AND THE EFFECT OF FUNCTION TYPE

Due to declined birthrate and the increased aging population, solving the problem of labor shortage has become important. Introducing robotic labors could effectively help older adults’ daily lives. However, older adults’ acceptance of robots was lower than younger adults. Robot’s appearance might be one of the reasons. The Uncanny Valley (UV) refers to the phenomenon that people rate more positively as robots become more humanlike, but only up to a certain point; as it approaches near-perfect similarity of human appearance, likeability drops and forms an uncanny valley. Nonetheless, previous results supporting the UV were mainly from younger adults. We examined whether the UV is also applicable for older and middle-aged adults. We also examined whether the acceptance of function (companion vs. service) would change based on robot appearance, and whether robot-induced traits have any relation with the acceptance of robot function. We asked younger (N= 80, age 18-39), middle-aged (N= 87, age 40-59), and older (N= 88, age 60-87) adults to view each picture of 84 robots and evaluate their impression of each robot and intention of use regarding robot function. Contrary to the UV found for younger and middle-aged adults, older adults did not show UV–they preferred humanlike over non-humanlike robots, regardless of the robot function. Scores on each trait–except for authoritativeness–showed positive correlations with the acceptance of functions. These findings imply that the design of assistive robots should take UV into consideration by customizing robots’ appearances and functions to different age groups.

Uncanny Valley Effects on Friendship Decisions in Virtual Social Networking Service.

Drawing on the uncanny valley effects (UVE) hypothesis and related works on avatar-based interactions, this study investigates the role of UVE (i.e., a feeling of eeriness), induced by avatar realism and animacy, on the perceived trustworthiness (PT) of an avatar user, and subsequent decisions to befriend that avatar user in a virtual social networking service (SNS). Specifically, the current study examines whether (1) the realism (hyperrealistic vs. cartoonish) and animacy (animate vs. still) of avatars, rendered through a 3D scanning technology, will induce a feeling of eeriness as a result of UVE; (2) the degree to which perceivers experience a feeling of eeriness will negatively bias the PT of an avatar user; and (3) PT, determined by UVE, will serve a role as a gating mechanism for the decision whether to befriend the unknown avatar user in a virtual SNS. Results from a two (realism: cartoonish vs. hyperrealistic) × two (animacy: still vs. animate) between-subjects online experiment (N = 134) indicated that a feeling of eeriness, induced by the realism and animacy of avatars, negatively biased the PT of the avatar user, and this, in turn, led avatar perceivers to reject a friend request sent from the unknown avatar user. These results call into the question the effectiveness of rendering avatar realism in social virtual environments. Overall, the findings of our research provide theoretical as well as practical implications for the design of avatars in virtual SNSs.

Artificial Intelligence & Popular Music: SKYGGE, Flow Machines, and the Audio Uncanny Valley

This article presents an overview of the first AI-human collaborated album, Hello World, by SKYGGE, which utilizes Sony’s Flow Machines technologies. This case study is situated within a review of current and emerging uses of AI in popular music production, and connects those uses with myths and fears that have circulated in discourses concerning the use of AI in general, and how these fears connect to the idea of an audio uncanny valley. By proposing the concept of an audio uncanny valley in relation to AIPM (artificial intelligence popular music), this article offers a lens through which to examine the more novel and unusual melodies and harmonization made possible through AI music generation, and questions how this content relates to wider speculations about posthumanism, sincerity, and authenticity in both popular music, and broader assumptions of anthropocentric creativity. In its documentation of the emergence of a new era of popular music, the AI era, this article surveys: (1) The current landscape of artificial intelligence popular music focusing on the use of Markov models for generative purposes; (2) posthumanist creativity and the potential for an audio uncanny valley; and (3) issues of perceived authenticity in the technologically mediated “voice”.

Uncanny but not confusing: Multisite study of perceptual category confusion in the Uncanny Valley

Android robots that resemble humans closely, but not perfectly, can provoke negative feelings of dislike and eeriness in humans (the “Uncanny Valley” effect). We investigated whether category confusion between the perceptual categories of “robot” and “human” contributes to Uncanny Valley aversion. Using a novel, validated corpus of 182 images of real robot and human faces, we precisely estimated the shape of the Uncanny Valley and the location of the perceived robot/human boundary. To implicitly measure confusion, we tracked 358 participants’ mouse trajectories as they categorized the faces. We observed a clear Uncanny Valley, though with some interesting differences from standard theoretical predictions; the initial apex of likability for highly mechanical robots indicated that these robots were still moderately dislikable, and the Uncanny Valley itself was positioned closer to the mechanical than to the human-like end of the spectrum. We also observed a pattern of categorization suggesting that humans do perceive a categorical robot/human boundary. Yet in contrast to predictions of the category confusion mechanism hypothesis, the locations of the Uncanny Valley and of the category boundary did not coincide, and mediation analyses further failed to support a mechanistic role of category confusion. These results suggest category confusion does not explain the Uncanny Valley effect.

The other race effect in the uncanny valley: Comparisons of Japan and Norway

The other race effect in the uncanny valley: Comparisons of Japan and Norway

Virtual Faces Evoke Only a Weak Uncanny Valley Effect: An Empirical Investigation With Controlled Virtual Face Images.

The uncanny valley (UV) hypothesis suggests that increasingly human-like robots or virtual characters elicit more familiarity in their observers (positive affinity) with the exception of near-human characters that elicit strong feelings of eeriness (negative affinity). We studied this hypothesis in three experiments with carefully matched images of virtual faces varying from artificial to realistic. We investigated both painted and computer-generated (CG) faces to tap a broad range of human-likeness and to test whether CG faces would be particularly sensitive to the UV effect. Overall, we observed a linear relationship with a slight upward curvature between human-likeness and affinity. In other words, less realistic faces triggered greater eeriness in an accelerating manner. We also observed a weak UV effect for CG faces; however, least human-like faces elicited much more negative affinity in comparison. We conclude that although CG faces elicit a weak UV effect, this effect is not fully analogous to the original UV hypothesis. Instead, the subjective evaluation curve for face images resembles an uncanny slope more than a UV. Based on our results, we also argue that subjective affinity should be contrasted against subjective rather than objective measures of human-likeness when testing UV.

It matters to me if you are human - Examining categorical perception in human and nonhuman agents

Abstract Humanlike but not perfectly human agents frequently evoke feelings of eeriness, a phenomenon termed the Uncanny Valley (UV). The Categorical Perception Hypothesis proposes that effects associated with the UV are due to uncertainty as to whether to categorize agents falling into the valley as “human” or “nonhuman”. However, since UV studies have traditionally looked at agents of varying human-likeness, it remains unclear whether UV-related effects are due to categorical uncertainty in general or are specifically evoked by categorizations that require decisions regarding an agent's human-likeness. Here, we used mouse tracking to determine whether agent spectra with (i.e., robot-human) and without (i.e., robot-animal and robot-stuffed animal) a human endpoint cause phenomena related to categorical perception to comparable extents. Specifically, we compared human and nonhuman agent spectra with respect to existence and location of a category boundary (H1-1 and H2-1), as well as the magnitude of cognitive conflict around the boundary (H1-2 and H2-2). The results show that human and nonhuman spectra exhibit category boundaries (H1-1) at which cognitive conflict is higher than for less ambiguous parts of the spectra (H1-2). However, in human agent spectra cognitive conflict maxima were more pronounced than for nonhuman agent spectra (H2-1) and category boundaries were shifted towards the human endpoint of the spectrum (H2-2). Overall, these results suggest a quantitatively, though not qualitatively, different categorization process for spectra containing human endpoints. Possible reasons and the impact for virtual and robotic agent design are discussed.

The uncanny of mind in a machine: Humanoid robots as tools, agents, and experiencers

The uncanny valley hypothesis suggests that a high (but not perfect) human-likeness of robots is associated with feelings of eeriness. We distinguished between experience and agency as psychological representations of human-likeness. In four online experiments, vignettes about a new generation of robots were presented. The results indicate that a robot's capacity to feel (experience) elicits stronger feelings of eeriness than a robot's capacity to plan ahead and to exert self-control (agency, Experiment 1A), which elicits more eeriness than a robot without mind (robot as tool, Experiments 1A and 1B). This effect was attenuated when the robot was introduced to operate in a nursing environment (Experiment 2). A robot's ascribed gender did not influence the difference between the eeriness of robots introduced as experiencers, agents, or tools (Experiment 3). Additional analyses yielded some evidence for a non-linear (quadratic) effect of participants' age on the robot mind effects.

Neural Mechanisms for Accepting and Rejecting Artificial Social Partners in the Uncanny Valley.

Artificial agents are becoming prevalent across human life domains. However, the neural mechanisms underlying human responses to these new, artificial social partners remain unclear. The uncanny valley (UV) hypothesis predicts that humans prefer anthropomorphic agents but reject them if they become too humanlike—the so-called UV reaction. Using fMRI, we investigated neural activity when subjects evaluated artificial agents and made decisions about them. Across two experimental tasks, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) encoded an explicit representation of subjects' UV reactions. Specifically, VMPFC signaled the subjective likability of artificial agents as a nonlinear function of humanlikeness, with selective low likability for highly humanlike agents. In exploratory across-subject analyses, these effects explained individual differences in psychophysical evaluations and preference choices. Functionally connected areas encoded critical inputs for these signals: the temporoparietal junction encoded a linear humanlikeness continuum, whereas nonlinear representations of humanlikeness in dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC) and fusiform gyrus emphasized a human–nonhuman distinction. Following principles of multisensory integration, multiplicative combination of these signals reconstructed VMPFC's valuation function. During decision making, separate signals in VMPFC and DMPFC encoded subjects' decision variable for choices involving humans or artificial agents, respectively. A distinct amygdala signal predicted rejection of artificial agents. Our data suggest that human reactions toward artificial agents are governed by a neural mechanism that generates a selective, nonlinear valuation in response to a specific feature combination (humanlikeness in nonhuman agents). Thus, a basic principle known from sensory coding—neural feature selectivity from linear–nonlinear transformation—may also underlie human responses to artificial social partners.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Would you trust a robot to make decisions for you? Autonomous artificial agents are increasingly entering our lives, but how the human brain responds to these new artificial social partners remains unclear. The uncanny valley (UV) hypothesis—an influential psychological framework—captures the observation that human responses to artificial agents are nonlinear: we like increasingly anthropomorphic artificial agents, but feel uncomfortable if they become too humanlike. Here we investigated neural activity when humans evaluated artificial agents and made personal decisions about them. Our findings suggest a novel neurobiological conceptualization of human responses toward artificial agents: the UV reaction—a selective dislike of highly humanlike agents—is based on nonlinear value-coding in ventromedial prefrontal cortex, a key component of the brain's reward system.

PERCEIVED VISUAL CGI FAMILIARITY TOWARDS UNCANNY VALLEY THEORY IN FILM

In the enhancement of the advanced technology, the uncanny valley is becoming a high-stakes concern of the entertainment industry to produce good films and animations (Chaminade et al., 2007). Therefore, this study aims to analyse participants’ familiarity towards the usage of digital characters as actors. Then, this article is to convey on how the uncanny valley factors affect audience’s attention in watching films with computer graphic imagery (CGI) elements in films. The researcher has selected visual stimuli that are divided into (4 x 4 factorial design) with 2 subjects of realistic and accurate human characters, meanwhile the second stimuli, researcher selected 2 subjects with minimum characteristic of human likeness. The surveys conducted are self-administered manner with combination of videos and images, distributed online via email and social network. This research concludes, the more familiarity and expectations of the audiences, the higher discomfort feeling when looking to a CGI made character. This illustrates that the longer a duration of CG actors in action, the higher significant weaknesses and substantial of superficial visuals. Therefore, this research is beneficial to assists artists and digital creative directors in digital actor’s creation, and guidance for developing more realistic actors in future projects.

Improvement of User Performance in Virtual Reality by Boosting Sense of Agency

Virtual reality is a relatively new field of human activity that is seeing a greater influx of users in the recent years thanks to consumer versions of virtual reality head mounted display sets providing the necessary image fidelity for the early adopters. That being said, there are still several obstacles that virtual reality applications have to overcome in order for the user to finally accept it. While physiological complications like simulator sickness are a subject for medical students, the other issue, namely the uncanny valley or the acceptance problem is something purely technical. This paper reviews ways for improving user performance and engagement in virtual reality applications by addressing psychological aspects of the user to virtual environment interaction. The primary aspect is the sense of agency, which has been reviewed in detail and defined as a notion with complex structure. Its connections to sense of embodiment and sense of ownership have been reviewed and ways for their improvement were established. Sense of body ownership was reviewed and was proven as such that has no impact on user productivity. Thus, user avatar can be simplified without hindering the sense of agency. Each aspect or aspect group has been determined to have its ways for degradation and improvement. Additionally, several experiments have shown that user productivity and precision was positively influenced when they were presented with a higher fidelity simulation, resulting in a stronger sense of agency. While designing a better experience is a very application-specific task, creating a set of rules and a framework that enables these applications to follow a set of guidelines without developer effort is a universal notion. Framerate, image fidelity and avatar detail have been the primary target for methods of improvement: maximizing image fidelity while ignoring avatar detail and boosting framerate are all positively influencing the sense of agency and thus productivity. Lack of interruptions in input tracking also greatly improves the sense of agency, and hardware improvements are one of the methods of productivity boosting. To reach the set goals within reasonable hardware constraints however a foveated rendering method was suggested as a tool to optimally enhance the image fidelity based on recent findings about user’s peripheral vision in virtual reality.Ref. 19.

Evaluation of the uncanny valley hypothesis based on declared emotional response and psychophysiological reaction

Abstract The uncanny valley (UV) hypothesis suggests that the observation of almost human-like characters causes an increase of discomfort. We conducted a study using self-report questionnaire, response time measurement, and electrodermal activity (EDA) evaluation. In the study, 12 computer-generated characters (robots, androids, animated, and human characters) were presented to 33 people (17 women) to (1) test the effect of a background context on the perception of characters, (2) establish whether there is a relation between declared feelings and physiological arousal, and (3) detect the valley of the presented stimuli. The findings provide support for reverse relation between human-likeness and the arousal (EDA). Furthermore, a positive correlation between EDA and human-likeness appraisal reaction time upholds one of the most common explanations of the UV – the categorization ambiguity. The absence of the significant relationship between declared comfort and EDA advocates the necessity of physiological measures for UV studies.

Cinemacraft: exploring fidelity cues in collaborative virtual world interactions

The research presented in this paper explores the contribution of avatar fidelity to social interaction in virtual environments and how sensory fusion can improve these interactions. Specifically, we vary levels of interaction fidelity to investigate how responsiveness and behavioural realism affect people’s experience of interacting with virtual humans. This is accomplished through the creation of Cinemacraft, a technology-mediated immersive platform for collaborative human–computer interaction. Cinemacraft leverages a voxel game engine similar to Minecraft to facilitate collaborative interaction in a virtual 3D world and incorporates sensory fusion to improve the fidelity of real-time collaboration. The primary hypothesis of the study is that embodied interactions result in a higher degree of presence, and that sensory fusion can improve the quality of presence and co-presence. We tested our hypothesis through a user-study of 24 participants. Based on suggestions from existing literature, we sidestep the uncanny valley effect through the use of low fidelity avatars (a la Minecraft) and identify cues that impact users ratings of presence, co-presence and successful collaboration. The findings and ensuing data in this research can be applied to produce a more compelling platform for live collaborative interactions, performances, and empathetic storytelling. This research contributes to the field of immersive, collaborative interaction by making transparent the platform, methodology, instruments and code accessible for team members with less technological expertise, as well as developers aspiring to use interactive 3D media to promote further experimentation and conceptual discussions.

The "Uncanny Valley" and the Verisimilitude of Sexual Offenders--Part I

This Article is the first in a series of three articles in which I explain the cycle of misperception of sexual offenders that has encouraged the unconstitutional application of sexual offender laws, including civil commitment laws, in a false effort to quell public fear, protect children, and reduce sexual victimization. In this first Article of the series, I propose that this cycle of misperception and the resistance to the release of civilly committed sexual offenders may be, in part, the product of a novel phenomenon known as the “uncanny valley” effect.

Humanlike robots as employees in the hotel industry: Thematic content analysis of online reviews

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this study is to discover the public’s general perceptions of robots as frontline employees in the hotel industry based on YouTube online reviews. This study applied data mining techniques to the two most frequently viewed videos related to the employment of robots in hotels. Thematic content analysis was conducted based on the Godspeed dimensions. The findings suggest that potential users’ perceptions tend to be negative when it comes to any discussion of humanlike robots. However, people are more receptive towards robots with animated features. Finally, this study contributes to both theoretical and practical discussions on robots and their related modes of analyses. It raises potential problems in the Godspeed scale and uncanny valley theory, provides guidelines to hotels which intend to employ humanlike robots as frontline staff, and offers suggestions, such as promotional videos, to marketers.

The Perceived Human Likeness and Familiarity of Human Actors in Relationship to Digital Actors in Film

When human actors act opposite computer-generated (CG) Actors, they have to invent and imagine the actions and behaviour of these absent, non-existent actors on set. With CG Actors, it is understood that the more human they appear, the more they risk being influenced by the uncanny valley effect. The research question asked how the perceived humanness of CG and real human actors may be influenced by variations in the human actors’ performance. This is an area that has not been previously researched. The human actor’s performance was tested with three films with different levels of emotion, one film with eye contact, and a control film. The five films were shown to four hundred participants after which measuring instruments were completed. The results have shown that, when human and CG Actors interact in a film, the acting quality of the human actors has an impact on audiences’ perception of the humanness and familiarity of the CG Actors. When the human actor’s acting was natural, the human likeness and familiarity of the CG Actor was rated as lower (that is more inside the uncanny valley). When the human actor’s acting was poor and mechanical, the human likeness and familiarity of the CG Actor was rated as higher (more outside the uncanny valley). This indicates an inverse relationship between the perception of the human likeness and familiarity of the human actor and the perception of the human likeness of the CG Actor.

Attitude Towards Humanoid Robots and the Uncanny Valley Hypothesis

Abstract The main aim of the presented study was to check whether the well-established measures concerning the attitude towards humanoid robots are good predictors for the uncanny valley effect. We present a study in which 12 computer rendered humanoid models were presented to our subjects. Their declared comfort level was cross-referenced with the Belief in Human Nature Uniqueness (BHNU) and the Negative Attitudes toward Robots that Display Human Traits (NARHT) scales. Subsequently, there was no evidence of a statistical significance between these scales and the existence of the uncanny valley phenomenon. However, correlations between expected stress level while human-robot interaction and both BHNU, as well as NARHT scales, were found. The study covered also the evaluation of the perceived robots’ characteristic and the emotional response to them.

Eliza in the uncanny valley: anthropomorphizing consumer robots increases their perceived warmth but decreases liking

Consumer robots are predicted to be employed in a variety of customer-facing situations. As these robots are designed to look and behave like humans, consumers attribute human traits to them—a phenomenon known as the “Eliza Effect.” In four experiments, we show that the anthropomorphism of a consumer robot increases psychological warmth but decreases attitudes, due to uncanniness. Competence judgments are much less affected and not subject to a decrease in attitudes. The current research contributes to research on artificial intelligence, anthropomorphism, and the uncanny valley phenomenon. We suggest to managers that they need to make sure that the appearances and behaviors of robots are not too human-like to avoid negative attitudes toward robots. Moreover, managers and researchers should collaborate to determine the optimal level of anthropomorphism.

Help! Is my chatbot falling into the uncanny valley? An empirical study of user experience in human-chatbot interaction

Help! Is my chatbot falling into the uncanny valley? An empirical study of user experience in human-chatbot interaction

The uncanny valley: No need for any further judgments when an avatar looks eerie

Considering that a 3D scanning technology allows to create avatars that embody more authentic and rich information about its users, it could be expected that enhancing avatar realism will increase the accuracy of thin-slice judgments of the person represented by the avatar. However, previous studies suggest that the objective realism of avatars may not always lead to positive outcomes, and the activation of negative affect and the aversive motivational system through the uncanny valley effects may rather harm the accuracy of thin-slice judgments by making people distance themselves from available information in avatars. To validate this speculation, a 2 (Realism: Cartoonish vs. Hyper-realistic) x 2 (Animacy: Still vs. Animate) between-subjects experiment (N = 134) was conducted. In support of our prediction, results from an online experiment confirmed that hyper-realistic and animate avatars can induce a greater feeling of eeriness as compared to cartoonish and still avatars. This feeling of eeriness, evoked by the uncanny valley effects, suppressed the amount of information processing oriented for thin-slice judgments, and subsequently decreased the accuracy of extraversion and agreeableness judgments. Further theoretical implications of the findings are discussed.