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Assembling human empathy towards care robots: The human labor of robot sociality
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Assembling human empathy towards care robots: The human labor of robot sociality

Erika Kerruish
Emotion, Space and Society, Vol.41, 100840
2021
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Abstract

Care robot empathy assemblage affect paro care-o-bot affective labor
This paper conceptualizes human to robot empathy as empathetic arrangements configured in caring spaces. Analyzing empathy towards care robots as arrangements comprising robots, spaces, discourses, bodies and institutions enables recognition of the way empathy is about self-other relationships while eschewing an understanding of empathy in terms of a reciprocal relationship between human and robot. Situating the therapeutic, zoomorphic robot, Paro and the health care support robot, Care-O-Bot as part of empathetic arrangements draws attention to how the cultivation of empathy towards robots governs and regulates patient sociality. In particular, it shows that these robots do not function as substitutes for human carers but instead are dependent on human labor if they are to deliver therapy ethically and effectively. They rely on the affective labor of the patient and the labor of carers and others in the arrangement.

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