Ethical Design of Social Robots in Aged Care: A Literature Review Using an Ethics of Care Perspective

Abstract

With interest growing in social robots for older people, it is crucial to consider how robots can be designed to support wellbeing and ethical values in residential aged care. By applying Tronto’s ethics of care framework and the Care Centred Value-Sensitive Design methodology to existing literature, this paper investigates how caring values are expressed, achieved, or undermined in interactions among older adults, caregivers, and social robots in real-world aged care practices. We conducted a comprehensive review of 18 qualitative and mixed-method studies on the deployment of humanoid social robots in residential aged care settings. Our analysis of the literature through a care ethics lens ..