Stine Trentemøller’s research while affiliated with Aarhus University and other places

Perspectives on Robots brings forth voices of different stakeholders engaged in or affected by new robot development to deliver a reality check on what robots are and what we can expect them to do. How will the robots developed today influence the nurses, teachers, physiotherapists, car mechanics, and cleaning staff of the future? And how are these potential users currently involved in the processes of robot development? This research-based publication addresses these questions and more. Written together by an interdisciplinary team from the fields of anthropology, economics, engineering, sociology, and philosophy, the book raises awareness about ethical issues in robot development. Herein, you will find discussions on: - a robot ethics that considers users holistically in their everyday lives, - the practices needed to spark new types of collaboration and alignment in design, - the fears, expectations, and consequences of robotization, and - the strategies essential to ensuring that innovation is for the shared benefit of robot makers and affected stakeholders.

As robotic technologies rapidly enter our everyday lives, we are compelled to consider the ethical, legal, and societal (ELS) challenges that arise in connection to these changes. In this workshop, we will present a novel methodological approach to HRI that will: help to identify ELS issues through ethnographic research methods, encourage interdisciplinary collaboration, and broaden the scope of existing HRI research while providing concrete tools for addressing these ELS challenges. We aim to introduce ethnographic methods and unfold the benefits and challenges of conducting ethnographic research. We will engage participants through speaker presentations, lightning talks, moderated group discussions, and a group-work session focused on integrating new methods into attendees» own research practices. Workshop topics will draw on the content of selected position papers, centered around how we can use ethnographic methods in HRI research so that we can: better understand users, workplaces, and robots; identify and address ELS issues; and ultimately ensure the design of more ethical, sustainable, and responsible robotics.

In Science and Technology Studies (STS) the emergence of scientific knowledge has been studied from a wealth of creative angles. One aspect which has been left relatively unexplored is how universities as work places in- and exclude their members, and how these processes are related to culture. In this article we shall discuss how a focus on cultural clusters of meaning-making practices in scientific work places at universities in different European countries open up for understanding cultural differences in what male and female scientists are interested in and how they wish their knowledge to be acquired and acknowledged. We argue that different work place cultures in- and exclude members in accordance with their different acknowledgements of creative acts, risk-taking, 'useful science' and competition. Moreover, these patterns seem to be connected with a gendered quest for knowledge.