Improving Public Engagement with Ethical Complexities of Assistive Robots

In order for society to fully realise the potential benefits offered byassistive robots, a number of ethical challenges must firstly be addressed. Crucially, it is important to enhance public understanding of the ways in which societalethics can be used to formulate and guide the preferred behaviours of theserobots, particularly in scenarios which are ethically complex. Furthermore, it isalso important to ensure that the voices of end users are heard, and their inputused in the development process. In this paper we present EETAS, a methodology for using structured workshops to improve public understanding of assistiverobot ethical complexities. We also present DEETAS, a further digital-based anddesign-centric methodology for engaging potential end-users who may be reluctantto take part in collaborative workshops. In support of these two methodologieswe present the findings of an initial pilot study and usability study, showingan indicative trend that these processes are effective in engaging users and enhancingpublic understanding of the ethical complexities inherent in assistive robots.