PUB - Publikationen an der Universität Bielefeld

Disconfirming answers, e.g., negative responses to polar questions, are perceived as face-threatening and thus impolite. To mitigate the face-threat, speakers use indirect politeness (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Imo (2017), for example, observed that disconfirming answers are given using face-saving strategies, such as using variants of nein (“no”) or adding explanations. More generally, face-threats are influenced by relationship aspects, such as the social distance and power between interlocutors (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Lumer and Buschmeier (2022) found that distance to a robot is evaluated to be higher and that humans have more power over them (compared to human interlocutors). Interacting with robots should thus have lower face threatening potential Brown and Levinson (1987). It is, however, arguable whether the notion of face can be transferred to robots (Clark, 2018; Clark et al., 2021). We compare indirect politeness in disconfirming answers towards humans and social robots. Forty German native speakers interacted with a ‘Furhat’ robot, who first carried out a pretend language proficiency test, gave unrealistically bad ratings, and then requested feedback. The same disconfirmation eliciting feedback-questions were subsequently posed again by the study leader. We analysed the disconfirming answers using conversational analysis, focusing on hedging, delay of response, prosody, addition of laughter or explanations, as well as variations and frequency of forms of nein (Imo, 2017) – and contrasted their usage towards humans and robot. Our preliminary results show different use of politeness towards robots and humans. Disconfirming answers directed to the robot were, for example, more direct, using less face-saving strategies such as hedges or delays. Our findings can provide insights not only for endowing artificial agents with capabilities for handling the nuances of politeness, but also into the naturalness of human politeness strategies. ## References * Brown, P., & Levinson, S. C. (1987). _Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage_. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511813085 * Clark, L. A. (2018). Social boundaries of appropriate speech in HCI: A politeness perspective. _Proceedings of the 32nd International BCS Human Computer Interaction Conference_, 5. https://doi.org/10.14236/ewic/HCI2018.76 * Clark, L. A., Ofemile, A., & Cowan, B. R. (2021). Exploring verbal uncanny valley effects with vague language in computer speech. In B. Weiss, J. Trouvain, M. Barkat-Defradas, & J. J. Ohala (Eds.), _Voice attractiveness: Studies on Sexy, Likable, and Charismatic Speakers_ (pp. 317–330). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6627-1_17 * Imo, W. (2017). Über nein. Zeitschrift für Germanistische Linguistik, 45(1), 40–72. https://doi.org/doi:10.1515/zgl20170002 * Lumer, E., & Buschmeier, H. (2022). Perception of power and distance in human-human and human-robot rolebased relations. _Proceedings of the 2022 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction_, 895–899.