Abstract
When mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones were becoming more popular, an important question that psychologists and pediatricians asked was how interactions facilitated by these devices with screens may affect the functioning of children. Nowadays, when technology used by children, such as intelligent voice assistants, does not require a screen at all, these issues seem to fall into the background. Today, concerns are growing about the effect of interacting with voice-driven AI services, as it may potentially have a greater impact on children’s cognitive development than engaging with television or smartphones. The purpose of this paper is to outline potentially interesting directions of research in the field of voice assistant technology concerning how this solution may affect the functioning of children, and in particular if, and to what extent, it may redefine the dynamics of social contacts within and outside the family.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Dataset from research conducted by Engineering UK: For Tomorrow’s Engineers 2017 (2018). www.engineeringuk.com
Don’t let Mattel’s new “digital nanny” trade children’s privacy for profit. https://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/action/dont-let-mattels-new-digital-nanny-trade-childrens-privacy-profit
Critcher, C.: Making waves: historical aspects of public debates about children and mass media. In: The International Handbook of Children, Media and Culture, pp. 91–104 (2008)
Gabriel, N.: The Sociology of Early Childhood: Critical Perspectives (2017)
Nass, C., Brave, S.: Wired for Speech: How Voice Activates and Advances the Human-Computer Relationship. MIT Press, MA (2007)
Schroeder, J., Epley, N.: Mistaking minds and machines: how speech affects dehumanization and anthropomorphism. J. Exp. Psychol. Gen. 145, 1427–1437 (2016)
Piotrowski, J.T., Valkenburg, P.M.: Finding orchids in a field of dandelions: understanding children’s differential susceptibility to media effects. Am. Behav. Sci. 59, 1776–1789 (2015)
Valkenburg, P.M., Peter, J., Walther, J.B.: Media effects: theory and research. Ann. Rev. Psychol. 67, 315–338 (2016)
Mattel Pulls Aristotle Children’s Device After Privacy Concerns. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/05/well/family/mattel-aristotle-privacy.html
Wiederhold, B.K.: “Alexa, are you my mom?” The role of artificial intelligence in child development. Cyberpsychol. Behav. Soc. Netw. 21, 471–472 (2018)
On the Heels of Congressional Inquiry, Advocates Ask Mattel to Scrap “Aristotle,” AI Device Which Spies on Babies & Kids. http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/heels-congressional-inquiry-advocates-ask-mattel-scrap-%E2%80%9Caristotle%E2%80%9D-ai-device-which-spies-babies-kids
Bonfert, M., Spliethöver, M., Arzaroli, R., Lange, M., Hanci, M., Porzel, R.: If you ask nicely: a digital assistant rebuking impolite voice commands. In: Proceedings of the 20th ACM International Conference on Multimodal Interaction, pp. 95–102. ACM (2018)
Druga, S., Williams, R., Breazeal, C., Resnick, M.: “Hey Google is it OK if I eat you?” In: Proceedings of the 2017 Conference on Interaction Design and Children – IDC 2017 (2017)
Reid Chassiakos, Y. (linda), Chassiakos, Y. (linda) R., Radesky, J., Christakis, D., Moreno, M.A., Cross, C.: Council on communications and media: children and adolescents and digital media. Pediatrics. 138, e20162593 (2016)
De La Bastide, D.: Research Says Kids Will Be BFFs With Robots In the Future. https://interestingengineering.com/research-says-kids-will-be-bffs-with-robots-in-the-future
Yarosh, S., et al.: Children asking questions. In: Proceedings of the 17th ACM Conference on Interaction Design and Children – IDC 2018 (2018)
Newman, J.: To Siri with Love: A Mother, Her Autistic Son, and the Kindness of Machines. HarperCollins (2017)
Porcheron, M., Fischer, J.E., Reeves, S., Sharples, S.: Voice interfaces in everyday life. In: Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems – CHI 2018 (2018)
Flessert, M., Beran, M.J.: Delayed gratification. In: Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior, pp. 1–7 (2018)
Skorupska, K., Nunez, M., Kopec, W., Nielek, R.: Older adults and crowdsourcing: Android TV App for Evaluating TEDx Subtitle Quality. In: Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction (CSCW 2018), vol. 2 (2018)
Kopec, W., Skibiński, M., Biele, C., Skorupska, K., Jaskulska, A., Marasek, K.: Hybrid approach to automation, RPA and machine learning: a method for the human-centered design of software robots. In: Workshop on Industrial Internet of Things at CSCW 2018, NY, USA (2018)
Greene, J.D.: Solving the trolley problem. In: A Companion to Experimental Philosophy, pp. 173–189 (2016)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Biele, C., Jaskulska, A., Kopec, W., Kowalski, J., Skorupska, K., Zdrodowska, A. (2019). How Might Voice Assistants Raise Our Children?. In: Karwowski, W., Ahram, T. (eds) Intelligent Human Systems Integration 2019. IHSI 2019. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 903. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11051-2_25
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11051-2_25
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-11050-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-11051-2
eBook Packages: Intelligent Technologies and RoboticsIntelligent Technologies and Robotics (R0)