Coprolite Newsletter, March 2008

Did you hear about the recent study pitting a trained therapy dog named Sparky against AIBO, a robot dog made by Sony? The object was to see which one did a better job in making nursing home residents feel less lonely.

Researchers at St. Louis University took Sparky on weekly half-hour one-on-one visits with a group of people in nursing homes. Another group got visits from the robot dog. A third group got neither.

Most of the residents quickly got acquainted with Sparky. They began confiding in him, and he responded by listening intently, wagging his tail, and letting them pet him.

The people who were visited by AIBO took a while longer to get used to him, but soon they were talking to him too. He responded by wagging his tail, making some robotic dog-like noises, and blinking his lights.

All the residents took surveys at the beginning and end of the eight-week study to measure their level of loneliness. It turns out that both test groups felt less lonely in the end than the group that wasn't visited at all. It didn't make much difference whether they were visited by the real dog or the robot.

My question is, was it really the robot dog that made the residents feel better? Did AIBO knock on the door by himself, or was he accompanied on the visit by a human being? And did that human being seem to act pleased and start jotting down notes when the resident reacted to the dog? We old folks aren't totally stupid when it comes to sensing what people want from us. We've had a few years of experience, after all.

My reservations about AIBO's effectiveness in this case may have something to do with the fact that, a few years ago, I got a similar toy dog for Christmas. Maybe the giver thought I was close to being ready for a nursing home, and would need the company.

Anyway, the toy dog was pretty smart. It could walk, and yip, and even be programmed to follow some simple commands.

By contrast, the real dog we've had for the past year, Miss Daisy, doesn't seem to be able to follow commands at all. She's an obedience school dropout -- twice. Either she's not the brightest bulb on the tree, or she's way too smart to let herself be dominated by a mere human. I can't tell which.

What Miss Daisy does excel at, though, is love. She loves to play, and she loves to cuddle in your arms. As I write this, sitting in my easy chair, she's lying across the back of my neck with her head on my shoulder. This is a very comforting thing, especially during a chilly Minnesota winter. And if somebody gave me a survey right now, I'd score pretty low on the loneliness scale.

The thing is, as smart and fun as the toy dog was, I don't know where it is right now. Haven't paid any attention to it lately. But there's no doubt where Miss Daisy is, or where she'll be almost every time I sit in this chair. Warmth and love trump intelligence every time.

I've got a couple of suggestions for the folks in St. Louis next time they do a similar study.

First, they might try just sending the human researchers in without the dogs, real or mechanical. It's very possible it was the human contact that made the nursing home residents feel better.

Secondly, it might be interesting to experiment with a different kind of robot. For example, this coming weekend my granddaughter is taking care of a mechanical baby as a school home economics project. At random hours of the day or night, the baby will start crying. My granddaughter has to figure out whether the baby is wet, hungry, sleepy, or whatever. Sensors in the robotic baby keep a record of how long it takes her to take care of the problem.

Maybe a robot baby would be even better than a robot dog in curing loneliness. At least it should work if the researchers modify it so it spends less time crying and more time giggling. Just as love trumps cleverness, laughing trumps crying.

That's something most seniors have already learned, whether it was from dogs or robots or maybe even each other.

––Wayne Adams
wayne@coprolites.com

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