2025 WSC Weekly：养儿不防老那么养个机器人可以吗？

WSC Weekly2025世界学者杯

the World Scholar's Cup

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2025年第1期

Weekly Intro

随着老龄化加剧，“养儿防老”的概念淡化，很多人开始把希望寄托在机器人身上。如今科技发展迅速，为啥养老机器人还没真正普及，反而屡屡被吐槽、没人买账？本期 Weekly，带你一探究竟！

2025 No.1养儿不防老，那么养个机器人可以吗？

Are elderly care robots the solution for an aging society?

机器人养老靠谱吗

你是否畅想过自己的老年生活？在人口出生率下降、人口老年化日益加深的今天，养老问题成为全社会关注的重点议题。在传统的社会中，老年人的照护主要依靠家庭，也有的老年选择雇用专业的护理人员。

如今，人工智能技术的迅猛发展为养老领域打开了新的思路，越来越多的学者和企业把目光投向了机器人养老的可能性。那么，使用机器人来护理老年人，是一个靠谱的选择吗？

Have you ever thought about your old age? With a declining birth rate and an increasingly aging population, the issue of aging has become a key concern for society as a whole. In traditional societies, the care of the elderly mainly relies on the family, while some elderly choose to hire professional caregivers.

Nowadays, the rapid development of artificial intelligence technology has opened up new ideas in the field of elderly care, and more and more scholars and companies are focusing on the possibility of robotic elderly care. So, is it really reliable to use robots to care for the elderly?

日本的养老探索

日本是老年护理机器人领域的先驱。作为全球老龄化最严重的国家之一，日本在过去二十多年里一直致力于研发用于照顾老年人的机器人，尤其是在2010年代，公共和私人投资大幅加速。

到2018年，仅国家政府就已投入超过3亿美元用于此类设备的研发。在政府的大力支持下，日本企业推出了大量的护理机器人。护理机器人有多种形态和用途。

有些用于身体护理，例如帮助无法自行起身的老年人站立；辅助他们移动和锻炼；监测其身体活动并检测跌倒情况；喂食；帮助洗浴或如厕。

另一些机器人则旨在提供社交和情感支持，以管理、减缓甚至预防认知能力下降；它们还可以提供陪伴和治疗，帮助护理人员更轻松地照顾患有痴呆症的老年人，并减少护理人员的需求。

Japan is a pioneer in the field of elderly care robots. As one of the most aging countries in the world, Japan has been working on the development of robots for the care of the elderly for more than two decades, with public and private investment accelerating dramatically, especially in the 2010s. By 2018, the national government alone had invested more than $300 million in the development of such devices. With strong government support, Japanese companies have introduced a large number of care robots. Care robots come in various shapes and sizes.

Some are meant for physical care, including machines that can help lift older people if they’re unable to get up by themselves; assist with mobility and exercise; monitor their physical activity and detect falls; feed them; and help them take a bath or use the toilet.

Others are aimed at engaging older people socially and emotionally in order to manage, reduce, and even prevent cognitive decline; they might also provide companionship and therapy for lonely older people, make those with dementia-related conditions easier for care staff to manage, and reduce the number of caregivers required for day-to-day care.

养老机器人遇冷

尽管机器人得到了政府的大力支持，并且工程师和程序员在技术上取得了真正的突破，但在大多数日本人的日常生活中，包括老年护理领域，机器人并未成为重要的组成部分。

一项针对9,000多家日本养老机构的全国性调查显示，截至2019年，仅约10%的机构引入了护理机器人。而2021年的另一项研究发现，在一组提供家庭护理的444名受访者中，只有2%的人曾经使用过护理机器人。此外，一些证据表明，即便购买了机器人，许多护理机构在短时间使用后便将其搁置，最终被锁进储物柜。

Despite the publicity, government support, and subsidies—and the real technological achievements of engineers and programm-ers—robots don’t really feature in any major aspect of most people’s daily lives in Japan, including elder care.

A major national survey of over 9,000 elder-care institutions in Japan showed that in 2019, only about 10% reported having introduced any care robot, while a 2021 study found that out of a sample of 444 people who provided home care, only 2% had experience with a care robot. There is some evidence to suggest that when robots are purchased, they often end up being used for only a short time before being locked away in a cupboard.

理想与现实

阿兰图灵研究所的研究员詹姆斯·赖特在日本养老院进行了一项为期18个月的田野调查，他的研究结果表明，老年护理机器人所承诺的愿景与其实际应用之间存在脱节。

在赖特所研究的养老院中，有三种护理机器人：起重机器人Hug，旨在帮助护理人员抬起老人；机器海豹Paro，提供仿动物疗法，并充当患有痴呆症老人的情绪干预工具；类人机器人Pepper，负责组织娱乐和健身活动，以便护理人员腾出时间处理其他事务。

James Wright, a researcher at The Alan Turing Institute, conducted an 18-month field study in Japanese nursing homes, and his findings suggest a disconnect between the vision promised by elder care robots and their practical application. In the nursing homes James Wright studied, there were three types of care robots: Hug, a lifting robot designed to help caregivers lift the elderly; Paro, a robotic seal that provides animal-like therapy and serves as an emotional intervention tool for seniors with dementia; and Pepper, a humanoid robot that organizes recreational and fitness activities so that caregivers can be freed up to take care of other matters.

群众不买账

然而，问题很快暴露出来。Hug 仅在使用几天后便被护理人员放弃，原因是它操作繁琐，搬运费时，影响了护理人员与老年人的互动。此外，能够被机器舒适地抬起的老年人数量也非常有限。Paro 则受到护理人员和老人更积极的评价。这款毛绒玩具形状的机器海豹会在用户抚摸和交谈时发出声音、摆动头部和尾巴。

然而，问题也随之而来。有一位老人试图剥掉Paro的“皮毛”，另一位则对它产生了过度依赖，不愿在没有Paro陪伴的情况下进食或入睡。护理人员不得不密切关注Paro的使用情况，而它也未能有效减少患严重痴呆症老人的重复行为模式。

Pepper 主要用于每日的娱乐活动，比如代理老人做体操。然而，护理人员很快发现，为了让老人跟随机器人做体操，他们必须站在旁边模仿它的动作，并重复其指令。由于Pepper的音乐和动作种类有限，几周后，老人们开始感到无聊，护理人员也逐渐减少了它的使用频率。

But problems quickly became apparent. Staff stopped using Hug after only a few days, saying it was cumbersome and time consuming to wheel from room to room—cutting into the time they had to interact with the residents. And only a small number of them could be lifted comfortably using the machine.

Paro was received more favorably by staff and residents alike. Shaped like a fluffy, soft toy seal, it can make noises, move its head, and wiggle its tail when users pet and talk to it. At first, care workers were quite happy with the robot.

However, difficulties soon emerged. One resident kept trying to “skin” Paro by removing its outer layer of synthetic fur, while another developed a very close attachment, refusing to eat meals or go to bed without having it by her side. Staff ended up having to keep a close eye on Paro’s interactions with residents, and it didn’t seem to reduce the repetitive behavior patterns of those with severe dementia. Pepper was used to run recreation sessions that were held every afternoon. Instead of leading an activity like karaoke or having a conversation with residents. But care workers quickly realized that to get residents to participate in the exercise routine, they had to stand next to the robot, copying its movements and echoing its instructions. Since there was a relatively small set of songs and exercise routines, boredom also started to set in after a few weeks, and they ended up using Pepper less often.

消耗更多人力

赖特认为，这些机器人未能实现“减少人力”的承诺，反而需要护理人员额外付出精力来管理它们：机器人需要搬运、维护、清洁、启动、操作、向老人反复解释其用途，在使用过程中持续监控，并在使用后妥善存放。

越来越多的研究表明，护理机器人往往增加了护理人员的工作量，而不是减少它。然而，更值得注意的是，它们改变了护理工作的性质：过去，护理人员会自主设计娱乐活动，并会主动与老人交谈互动，然而在使用机器人后，护理人员们主要在远处监控情况，他们必须缩短与老人的互动时间，以便腾出时间将机器人推回储藏室。原本注重社交和沟通的护理工作都被新的任务所取代，这些任务涉及的更多是与机器人互动，而非与老人互动。

结果，护理机器人不仅未能为护理人员节省时间，反而减少了他们进行社交和情感护理的机会，降低了老年护理的人文关怀。

Wright concluded that the machines failed to save labor. The care robots themselves required care: they had to be moved around, maintained, cleaned, booted up, operated, repeatedly explained to residents, constantly monitored during use, and stored away afterwards.

Indeed, a growing body of evidence from other studies is finding that robots tend to end up creating more work for caregivers. But what was interesting was the type of work that they created. In the past, caregivers would design their own recreational activities and would initiate conversations and interactions with the elderly, however, with the use of the robot, caregivers, who primarily monitor the situation from a distance, must shorten their interactions with the elderly in order to free up time to push the robot back into the storage room. In other words, existing social and communication-oriented tasks tended to be displaced by new tasks that involved more interaction with the robots than with the residents.

Instead of saving time for staff to do more of the human labor of social and emotional care, the robots actually reduced the scope for such work.

Weekly关键词 Key Words

care robots 护理机器人

所属话题

#The Best is Yet to Be, or Not To Be?

相关阅读

https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/01/09/1065135/japan-automating-eldercare-robots/

Weekly FUN Quiz

相信现在你已经对“养老机器人”有了一定的了解啦！那就快来参与本期Weekly FUN Quiz👇，告诉老师你的答案吧！

Quiz

According to James Wright, which of the following descriptions of care robots is most accurate? 根据詹姆斯·赖特，以下哪项对护理机器人的描述最准确？

A. Creative but ineffective 有创意但效果不佳