Summary: Religious groups may find their credibility and financial support undermined with the growing use of AI and robot preachers, according to researchers.
The study involved experiments with the Mindar humanoid robot in Japan and Pepper in Singapore, both delivering sermons to audiences. Participants rated these robotic preachers as less credible than their human counterparts, contributing to decreased donations.
Despite some acceptance, the study highlights the importance of human connection and credibility in religious leadership.
Key Facts:
- Participants rated AI preachers as less credible, scoring an average of 3.12 out of 5, compared to human preachers who received an average score of 3.51.
- Use of AI preachers, such as Mindar and Pepper, led to reduced donations at temples in both Japan and Singapore.
- Even in a digital format, when sermons were said to be written by AI, they were deemed less credible, potentially leading to a decline in religious commitment.
Source: APA
As artificial intelligence expands across more professions, robot preachers and AI programs offer new means of sharing religious beliefs, but they may undermine credibility and reduce donations for religious groups that rely on them, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.
“It seems like robots take over more occupations every year, but I wouldn’t be so sure that religious leaders will ever be fully automated because religious leaders need credibility, and robots aren’t credible,” said lead researcher Joshua Conrad Jackson, PhD, an assistant professor at the University of Chicago in the Booth School of Business.
The research was published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
Jackson and his colleagues conducted an experiment with the Mindar humanoid robot at the Kodai-Ji Buddhist temple in Kyoto, Japan. The robot has a humanlike silicon face with moving lips and blinking eyes on a metal body. It delivers 25-minute Heart Sutra sermons on Buddhist principles with surround sound and multi-media projections.
Mindar, which was created in 2019 by a Japanese robotics team in partnership with the temple, cost almost $1 million to develop, but it might be reducing donations to the temple, according to the study.
The researchers surveyed 398 participants who were leaving the temple after hearing a sermon delivered either by Mindar or a human Buddhist priest. Participants viewed Mindar as less credible and gave smaller donations than those who heard a sermon from the human priest.
In another experiment in a Taoist temple in Singapore, half of the 239 participants heard a sermon by a human priest while the other half heard the same sermon from a humanoid robot called Pepper. That experiment had similar findings — the robot was viewed as less credible and inspired smaller donations.
Participants who heard the robot sermon also said they were less likely to share its message or distribute flyers to support the temple.
While participants said they believed human preachers were more credible, it was still a close contest with the robots. On a scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being most credible, the robot preachers received an average credibility rating of 3.12, compared with 3.51 for human preachers.
“This suggests that there are a lot of people out there who think robots could be effective preachers, but there are more people who aren’t convinced,” Jackson said.
While the robot preacher studies focused on Eastern religions, Jackson believes the findings could apply to other religions.
A third experiment included 274 Christian participants from the United States who read a sermon online. Half of the participants were told it was written by a human preacher while the other half were told the sermon was generated by a highly advanced AI program.
Participants in the AI sermon group reported the sermon was less credible because they felt an AI program had less capacity to think or feel like a human.
“Robots and AI programs can’t truly hold any religious beliefs so religious organizations may see declining commitment from their congregations if they rely more on technology than on human leaders who can demonstrate their faith,” Jackson said.
About this AI, robotics, and neurotheology research news
Author: APA Public Affairs
Source: APA
Contact: APA Public Affairs – APA
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Original Research: Open access.
“Exposure to Robot Preachers Undermines Religious Commitment” by Joshua Conrad Jackson et al. Journal of Experimental Psychology
Abstract
Exposure to Robot Preachers Undermines Religious Commitment
Over the last decade, robots continue to infiltrate the workforce, permeating occupations that once seemed immune to automation. This process seems to be inevitable because robots have ever-expanding capabilities.
However, drawing from theories of cultural evolution and social learning, we propose that robots may have limited influence in domains that require high degrees of “credibility”; here we focus on the automation of religious preachers as one such domain.
Using a natural experiment in a recently automated Buddhist temple (Study 1) and a fully randomized experiment in a Taoist temple (Study 2), we consistently show that religious adherents perceive robot preachers—and the institutions which employ them—as less credible than human preachers.
This lack of credibility explains reductions in religious commitment after people listen to robot (vs. human) preachers deliver sermons.
Study 3 conceptually replicates this finding in an online experiment and suggests that religious elites require perceived minds (agency and patiency) to be credible, which is partly why robot preachers inspire less credibility than humans.
Our studies support cultural evolutionary theories of religion and suggest that escalating religious automation may induce religious decline.
