Otakuism and the Appeal of Sex Robots

Frontiers in Psychology

article

Markus Appel¹  Caroline Marker¹  Martina Mara² 

[1] Human-Computer-Media Institute, University of Würzburg;Johannes Kepler University Linz, LIT Robopsychology Lab

关键词: sex robots;    anime;    manga;    fan culture;    otakuism;    shyness;    uncanny valley;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00569

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

Social robots are becoming increasingly prevalent in everyday life and sex robots are a sub-category of especially high public interest and controversy. Starting from the concept of the otaku , a term from Japanese youth culture that describes secluded persons with a high affinity for fictional manga characters, we examine individual differences behind sex robot appeal ( anime and manga fandom , interest in Japanese culture , preference for indoor activities , shyness ). In an online-experiment, 261 participants read one out of three randomly assigned descriptions of future technologies ( sex robot , nursing robot , genetically modified organism ) and reported on their overall evaluation, eeriness, and contact/purchase intentions. Higher anime and manga fandom was associated with higher appeal for all three future technologies. For our male subsample, sex robots and GMOs stood out as shyness yielded a particularly strong relationship to contact/purchase intentions for these new technologies.

【 授权许可】

CC BY