When expressive humanoid robots are awkward, people become wary – new brain study

People who interact with expressive robots that make mistakes react with suspicion rather than seeing the bots as malfunctioning machines.

By: Hasan Ayaz, Drexel University; Ewart J. de Visser, United States Air Force Academy; Frank Krueger, George Mason University, and Yigit Topoglu, United States Air Force Academy, The Conversation

Outlets: The Conversation

Published: August 3, 2026

Words: 921

Last Updated: 50 minutes ago

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By Hasan Ayaz, Drexel University; Ewart J. de Visser, United States Air Force Academy; Frank Krueger, George Mason University, and Yigit Topoglu, United States Air Force Academy

People become more suspicious of a humanoid robot that makes errors, especially when the robot is an expressive conversation partner.

In our new study published in the journal Science Robotics, we had 50 people hold conversations and make joint decisions with the commercial humanoid robot Pepper, which …

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