Where are we at? A review of the advances in the ethical aspects of human-robot collaboration

Human-robot collaboration (HRC) is revolutionising the future of manufacturing and service industries. Ethical research on HRC regards all issues of safeguarding humans from unintended and potentially unethical risks and hazards associated with collaborative robots (also known as “cobots”). Within the CoBots domain, the term Roboethics has been coined to refer to the social and ethical aspects of the design, development, and employment of collaborative and intelligent robots, which could be clustered in four typologies: (1) robots as machines; (2) robots may have an intrinsic ethical dimension and be able to trigger emotions and feelings from users; (3) robots are seen as moral agents; (4) robots are an evolution of a new species, having a conscience and greater intellectual dimensions. This paper aims to provide a review of the available literature in the field to map the ethical aspects and concerns that are discussed in the HRC domain, taking into account the above Roboethics typologies. The paper will conclude outlining an agenda for future ethical research in HRC, specifically where current gaps emerge.