The ontological and functional status of robots: How firm our representations are? Ilaria Gaudiello, Sébastien Lefort, Elisabetta Zibetti ⇑ Laboratoire CHART-LUTIN (Cognition Humaine & Artificielle EA 4004, Université Paris 8, EPHE Paris, Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie, Paris), Université Paris 8, 2 rue de la liberté, 93526 Saint Denis-Cedex 02, France article info Article history: Keywords: Robot representation Essentialism and anti-essentialism New ontological category hypothesis Bot’n Roll robotics kit abstract Robot representation is a moving target: according to our previous experience and to the context of use, we constantly reinvent what we consider to be ‘robot’. In this paper we investigate teenagers’ robot representation, with special concerns to educational robots. By robot representation we mean its (i) ontological and (ii) functional status. Particularly, we seek to understand whether teenagers’ judgment about (i) and (ii) changes when they become acquainted with robots. To this aim, we carried out an experimental study with pre- and post-questionnaires with 79 participants during a robotic event: the RoboParty Ò . Results show that building and programming a robot fosters a more nuanced judgment about robots’ belonging to the living and non-living categories but, on the other side, a more definite judgment about the educative functions that a robot may serve. Thus, at this stage of technology development in contemporary society, robots seem to share something with living entities and some other things with non-living ones. Just like living entities, robots hold an ontological status that admits degrees; similarly to non-living entities, robots need to have a precise function in order for users to have a meaningful interaction with them. Moreover, contrary to our prediction and to current literature, no new category – beyond those of living and non-living ones-seems to emerge in teenagers’ ontology. However, cues pointing out that dealing with robots might have an impact on traditional boundaries of common-sense ontology are discussed. Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction In recent years, there has been a growing interest in people’s representations of robots, within several complementary fields of study: Cognitive Psychology (Jipson & Gelman, 2007; Kahn, Friedman, Perez-Granados, & Freier, 2006; Beran, Ramirez- Serrano, Kuzyk, Nugent, & For, 2011; Bernstein & Crowley, 2008), Science and Technology Education (e.g., Slangen, van Keulen & Gravemeijer, 2011) and Anthropology (Grimaud & Vidal, 2012). The reason for this interest lies in a shared wonder at a new tech- nology which, despite having the status of a manmade entity – i.e., an artifact – has enough power to surpass people in the accom- plishment of several decision-making and physical tasks. This mixed definition of the robot, as an entity that possesses at the same time something that is greater than and something that is less than living and non-living beings, seems to challenge tradi- tional ontological categories (Severson & Carlson, 2010). That is, the difficulty involved in assigning robots either to the category of living entities or to that of non-living entities has led researchers from different fields not only to postulate the creation of a com- pletely new category of objects, but also to revise the traditional concept of ‘‘being alive’’ itself. In the words of MacDorman and colleagues (MacDorman, Vasudevan & Ho, 2009, p. 486): ‘‘Among all human artifacts, perhaps robots share the most in com- mon with their maker. Like computers, and in fact because they are controlled by computers, they can process huge amounts of infor- mation. Like powered equipment, they can manipulate their environment and move within it. And like dolls, mannequins and other effigies, they can resemble us – either abstractly or down to the dimples of our cheeks. Nevertheless, the differences between machine and maker are profound. Metabolism, life span, sexual reproduction, ancestry, culture and consciousness for now distin- guish us from robots. Thus, the similarities and differences between us and them circumscribe a chasm that is at once narrow and deep.’’ http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.03.060 0747-5632/Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author at: EA 4004 CHArt – Cognitions Humaine & ARTificielle, Université Paris 8, 2 rue de la liberté, 93526 Saint Denis-Cedex 02, France. Tel.: +33 (0)1 49 40 64 79; fax: +33 (0)1 49 40 67 54. E-mail addresses: i.gaudiello@gmail.com (I. Gaudiello), sebast.lefort@gmail.com (S. Lefort), ezibetti@univ-paris8.fr, ezibetti@gmail.com (E. Zibetti). Computers in Human Behavior 50 (2015) 259–273 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Computers in Human Behavior journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/comphumbeh