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Robot colleagues have a bad effect - 8th January 2024

A new study, conducted by a team of researchers at the Technical University of Berlin, suggests that working with robots may make workers less effective.

Early studies in psychology have highlighted a feature called 'social loafing'. This phenomenon is where workers become less productive when involved on the same team as a respected, reliable colleague. Researchers in this recent study hoped to reveal whether social loafing came about with a robot co-worker as well. As study author Dietlind Cymek said, "Teamwork is a mixed blessing."

Participants in the study were split into test and control groups before being given a task – to identify faults on electrical circuit boards. Researchers then informed the test group they'd be joined by a robot called Panda, who'd assist them in finding the mistakes. For the first 75 percent of the experiment the robot assistant successfully picked out every fault, generating trust in the co-workers. In contrast, in the last few circuit boards, Panda failed to spot all the issues.

Researchers noted that during the experiment itself, both groups were equally attentive, spending a roughly equal length of time inspecting the circuit boards. With five errors on each board, the control group identified on average 4.2 errors, while the test group, with Panda's assistance, found merely 3.3.

In a survey following the research experiment, each group claimed they'd carried out the task fully and experienced a sense of responsibility. This suggests they were unaware of working less competently. Scientists assume it could be due to the "looking not seeing" effect, where workers think less critically about a project when they rely on their colleague.

In real workplaces, employees with robot assistants are bound to be even less attentive. Scientists accepted that the study had one major limitation – social loafing is considerably more difficult to spot under research conditions.