Recognizing situations that demand trust

Abstract

This article presents an investigation into the theoretical and computational aspects of trust as applied to robots. It begins with an in-depth review of the trust literature in search of a definition for trust suitable for implementation on a robot. Next we apply the definition to our interdependence framework for social action selection and develop an algorithm for determining if an interaction demands trust on the part of the robot. Finally, we apply our algorithm to several canonical social situations and review the resulting indications of whether or not the situation demands trust.