Robot mirroring: Improving well-being by fostering empathy with an artificial agent representing the self

Abstract

Well-being has become a major societal goal. Being well means being physically and mentally healthy. Additionally, feeling empowered is also a component of well-being. Recently, self-tracking has been proposed as means to achieve increased awareness, thus, giving the opportunity to identify and decrease undesired behaviours. However, inappropriately communicated self-tracking results might cause the opposite effect. To address this, a subtle self-tracking feedback by mirroring the self’s state into an embodied artificial agent has been proposed. By eliciting empathy towards the artificial agent and fostering helping behaviours, users would help themselves as well. We searched the literature to find supporting or opposing evidence for the robot mirroring framework. The results showed an increasing interest in self-tracking technologies for well-being management. Current discussions disseminate what can be achieved with different levels of automation; the type and relevance of feedback; and the role that artificial agents, such as chatbots and robots, might play to support people’s therapies. These findings support further development of the robot mirroring framework to improve medical, hedonic, and eudaemonic well-being.