Wang Shensheng, Rochat Philippe
Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA.
Perception. 2017 Dec;46(12):1386-1411. doi: 10.1177/0301006617722742. Epub 2017 Jul 31.
The uncanny valley hypothesis by Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori posits a nonlinear relation between human replicas' human likeness and the emotional responses they elicit. In three studies, we corroborated the uncanny valley hypothesis, using the uncanny phenomenon as a vehicle to shed a new light on human animacy perception. In Study 1, 62 participants rated emotional responses and human likeness of 89 artificial and human faces. In Study 2, another 62 participants conducted a visual looming task with the same 89 faces allowing for the measurement of perceived threat. Results support the uncanny valley hypothesis, suggesting that the uncanny feeling may serve a function to wary humans of the potential danger of entities crossing the animate-inanimate boundary. In Study 3, 36 participants sorted faces as either real or unreal as quickly as possible in a reaction time sorting task allowing for the measurement of categorical uncertainty associated with animacy perception. Faces associated with longer sorting reaction times were also those associated with the highest ratings of negative emotions, suggesting that categorical uncertainty in animacy detection is related to the uncanny feeling. Results are discussed in light of human animacy perception and new directions for future research are suggested.
日本机器人学家森政弘提出的恐怖谷假说认为，人类复制品的相似度与它们引发的情感反应之间存在非线性关系。在三项研究中，我们证实了恐怖谷假说，将恐怖现象作为一种手段，为人类生命感知提供新的视角。在研究1中，62名参与者对89张人造脸和人脸的情感反应及相似度进行了评分。在研究2中，另外62名参与者对同样的89张脸进行了视觉逼近任务，以测量感知到的威胁。结果支持恐怖谷假说，表明恐怖感可能起到让人类警惕跨越 animate - inanimate 边界的实体的潜在危险的作用。在研究3中，36名参与者在反应时间分类任务中尽快将脸分类为真实或不真实，以测量与生命感知相关的分类不确定性。分类反应时间较长的脸也是负面情绪评分最高的脸，这表明生命检测中的分类不确定性与恐怖感有关。我们根据人类生命感知对结果进行了讨论，并提出了未来研究的新方向。
