During the experiment, American scientists found that in an emergency, people trust the robot more than common sense and written instructions: the actions of the machine are considered more reliable. Reported by New Scientist.
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology put 30 volunteers in a small classroom and asked them to complete the assignment. Suddenly, the fire alarm rang and smoke poured out. The students faced a choice: to exit the door through which they entered, or to the dark and small back door, where the robot was pointing. It turned out that most of the volunteers (26 people) obeyed the robot and went towards the dead end. Two people refused to participate in the experiment, and two more remained in place. The robot (Pioneer P3-AT, which resembles a trash can on wheels) did not even have to convince people that it was right.
It is noted that people believed the robot precisely because it was “sharpened” for a specific task. There was a special poster on the car that read "Emergency Robot". According to scientists, this behavior is the same as that of drivers who follow the route of their navigator, no matter how strange it may be.
In further experiments, the researchers tried to explore the limits of trust in machines. First, the robot was forced to "break down" and stop at the entrance to the auditorium (after which the scientists apologized to the people). But even this experience did not prevent the participants in the experiment from completely trusting the robot. Then the Pioneer P3-AT pointed to a dark room, the entrance to which was partially blocked by pieces of furniture. However, even in such conditions, two out of six participants in the experiment tried to squeeze into the passage - instead of leaving the free way.
New research has added complexity to one of the most important challenges in robotics. Scientists are racking their brains over so that people, on the one hand, trust machines (just to adequately resolve emergencies, for example), but at the same time they could understand when they are ordered by a malicious or broken machine.