提高注意力的机器人

浙江杭州市富阳区新登中学 胡君祥

机器人可以影响人的行为，提高人的注意力。

题材科技文章词数 难度 建议用时说明文体裁458 ★★★ 8 分钟

难词探意

1. humanoid /΄hjuːmənɔɪd/ adj. 类人的

2. cognition /kɒɡ΄nɪʃn/ n. 认知

3. neutral /΄njuːtrəl/ adj. 中立的

As prices drop and their functionality expands, you can expect to see humanoid robots in more places, including schools, airports, and hospitals. Will they influence human behavior?

In a study published today, scientists found that outstanding robots can help people concentrate. The experiment, published in Science Robotics, was based on something called the Stroop Task, which is widely used in psychology and described as the “gold standard” of attentional tests.It challenges participants to name the colors of words and ignore their meanings while calculating reaction time. The researchers put a modern twist on the task, though—this time, there was a robot in the room. The goal was to see if the presence of a robot would affect cognition, and the researchers found it did, but only when the robot was mean.

How do you make a robot mean? In this case, a meter-tall toy robot called a Meccanoid G15KS was made to respond to seven questions.The good robots told jokes, spoke about friendship,and described test subjects as nice. The bad robots replied to questions with passive aggressive comebacks, such as “I enjoy doing analysis programs but you would not understand” and statements like“I do not value friendship”. Then the participants rated the robots. “The more participants thought the robot made them uncomfortable, the greater was the improvement of Stroop performance,”the researchers wrote. “Not surprisingly, the bad robot was rated as less warm, friendly, and pleasant than the good robot.”

The study authors argue that robots are crossing the line in some situations from machines to social agents. That will change how humans interact with and behave around them.

“Similar to human presence, we could think that the presence of a robot could not be neutral in other situations like school or in the office when you are working,” Nicolas Spatola, one of the study authors, said in an email. “So before your boss decides to introduce a robot in your office, it could be a good idea to evaluate how you feel about it,how it can positively or negatively impact your work and how comfortable you may feel with it or if you feel a threat.”

Just 58 students from France participated the experiment, but the researchers found a significant increase in the speed of correct answers among those in the presence of a mean robot when compared to those who were with a nice robot or alone.In the future, robots, will almost certainly become more and more common in nursing homes, hotel check-in desks and elsewhere. “If we want to promote the use of robots in our daily life, it seems a need to first understand how Human Robot Interaction can impact human psychology,” Spatola said.

Reading Check

1. What was the finding of the new study?

A. The use of robots is rising.

B. Humanoid robots can be mean.

C. Robots become more functional.

D. Certain robots can sharpen our focus.

2. How did participants judge the robots?

A. By their words.

B. By their actions.

C. By their appearance.

D. By the Stroop Task.

3.What can we learn from Nicolas Spatola's words?

A. Be careful in using robots.

B. Quit the robot if it presents a threat.

C. Robots will have a good impact in offices.

D. Robots may replace humans in the workplace.

4. What was the limitation of the study?

A. The participants were too young.

B. The sample size wasn't very big.

C. The difference in speed was slight.D. The studying method wasn't scientific.

Language Study

Sentence for writing

The more participants thought the robot made them uncomfortable, the greater was the improvement of Stroop performance.

【信息提取】“the+比较级, the+比较级” 表示“越……，就越……”。

【句式仿写】你越年轻，学习就越容易。