IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2017 - 52

are embedded in. Societies and individual users draw
on popular images in the media and science fiction to
envisage what a robot might look like, what functions
it might perform and what desires it might fulfil.
These range from robots performing mechanical
tasks, such as housework or heavy lifting, to providing companionship.

The Shinto religion includes
man-made objects as part of the
natural world, putting humanoid
robots on a par with living creatures.

In the United States, where many robots are being
designed, science fiction and religion provide the context in which robots are imagined and perceived [6]. As
a "reality-shifting media" science fiction allows us to
manifest a particular vision of the future [6]. Science fiction often draws on religious themes of salvation and
apocalypse, simultaneously depicting artificial intelligence and humanoid robots as promising an idyllic
future, and at the same time destroying the human race
[7]. This cultural fear of robots potentially hinders their
widespread production and use. In U.S. culture, where
Christianity dominates, humanoid robots may challenge
the divinity of God by being created objects that are
given divine status [7].
Japan provides a useful comparison to American
culture in terms of the perception and role of robots.
Japanese acceptance of robots has been closely connected to ideas of life as expressed by Shinto and Buddhism, which consider that both living and non-living
creatures have a soul [2], [8]. For example, the Shinto
religion includes man-made objects as part of the natural world, putting humanoid robots on a par with living
creatures [2]. Robotic dogs have been given Buddhist
funerals in Japan when they reached the end of their
lives, after Sony stopped manufacturing new parts [9].
Recently, the Japanese government integrated the development of humanoid robots in its national government
policy "Innovation 25," intending humanoid robots to
support their economic growth plans towards the year
2025, largely due to population decline. Japanese society has been very eager to adopt humanoid robots, with
surveys indicating Japanese people prefer robots rather
than migrant workers take care of their children in a
country where immigration has been resisted for

socio-political reasons [2]. Japanese acceptance of
robots is further enhanced by popular culture that supports the integration of robots by often portraying them
as beloved members of society, for example in television shows such as Astro Boy.
Other studies have noted cultural differences in the
perception of robots for example, between Korea and
the United States [10]. Similar to Japan, Korean respondents viewed robots as potential members of their family and felt "warm, friendly and tender" towards them,
while U.S. respondents viewed robots as "modern" and
"functional," capable of providing expert advice as
personal assistants [10]. Weiss suggested European
users were more sceptical of robots and less willing to
interact with them [8]. A further study [11] comparing
Japanese and Australian perspectives on robots found
Japanese participants perceived robots had higher animacy, and were more intelligent and safer compared
with views of Australian participants.

Creating Robot Gender
In this article we examine gender as it is reflected in
physical form and roles. Within form, gender may be
expressed in any or all of the five human sensory
dimensions (e.g., visual, auditory, haptic). This would
also include behaviors such as walking style, which may
draw on anatomical differences or other stereotypes.
Gender is an important consideration in the development of humanlike, humanoid robot bodies. As Robertson notes, human bodies do not exist without gender
[2], and gender is more than just masculine or feminine
characteristics such as hair length. Gender is an important marker of identity that helps us to relate to one
another, and is shaped by cultural norms and practices.
As Butler argues in her seminal work, gender is performed [12], a performance achieved through particular
forms and behaviors that are embedded in social and
cultural constructs. In addition, seeing gender as a key
social marker also allows us to explore how the proliferation of humanoid robots might affect other aspects
of society.
An important historical development in humanmachine interaction contains a gendered element. The
Turing test, in which an interrogator must determine if
they are interacting with a machine or a human, was
originally designed as a gender test [13]. The interrogator had to decide which of two hidden people was a
woman and which was a man, based on text communication only. The man was instructed to pretend to be a
woman to deceive the interrogator. At the same time as
Turing was breaking down the human-machine barrier,
he also blurred the "cultural order of gender" [13]. Similar to Butler's argument, the test introduced the idea of
gender as a performance.

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine

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june 2017

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