While it’s perhaps fair to say that the mass automation of jobs that was predicted a few years ago has not transpired, the introduction of robotic and automated technology into the workplace has continued, such that people perhaps have a better idea of just what it entails.

New research from Georgia Tech aims to uncover what people think about robots, with a particular focus on any gender differentials that may appear when they think the robot is ‘male’ or ‘female’.  Alas, it soon became apparent that no real sexism was present depending on the perceived gender of the robot.

“This did surprise us. There was only a very slight difference in a couple of jobs but not significant. There was, for example, a small preference for a male robot over a female robot as a package deliverer,” the researchers say.

Humanizing machines

Despite our perception that machines are neither sentient or animate, it is nonetheless common for people to try and humanize machines in some way.  This is especially so for robots that are designed to be emotionally engaging.

While the participants may not have had differing opinions based on the supposed gender of the robots, they were nonetheless not especially complimentary about the capabilities of the machines.  This lack of faith was even present on tasks in which the machines actually performed pretty well.

“The results baffled us because the things that people thought robots were less able to do were things that they do well. One was the profession of surgeon. There are Da Vinci robots that are pervasive in surgical suites, but respondents didn’t think robots were competent enough,” the researchers say. “Security guard – people didn’t think robots were competent at that, and there are companies that specialize in great robot security.”

The volunteers pretty universally thought robots would fail as therapists, firefighters, nurses, and nannies, with particularly low expectations for their potential as comedians.  The only tasks they were even remotely confident the robots could perform were serving, delivering, and acting as a receptionist.

It’s not immediately clear where these competence biases originate from, but the researchers speculate that some of the media stories surrounding robots may have played a part.  It’s important that we have confidence in those within our team, however, so this apparent bias is something organizations need to consider when introducing robots into the workplace.