The Ethical Challenges of Humanoid Robots in Elderly Care

The use of humanoid robots to care for the elderly has been introduced as one of the effective solutions to solve the problems caused by the increase in the elderly population. This issue has faced various ethical challenges. The purpose of this study is to analyze the ethical dimensions and problems arising from the use of robots in the field of geriatric care with a view to civil law rules on robotics.

The present article, by studying the scientific and legal documents related to the subject of research and using analytical-descriptive method, addresses the ethical challenges related to the performance of robots caring for the elderly.

 In writing this article, ethical aspects including fidelity, honesty and originality of the text have been observed.

Recourse to robots with the aim of caring for the elderly in need of support, while solving some of the problems in this field, brings challenges such as threats to safety, deceiving the elderly, invasion of privacy, deprivation of autonomy; situations that can become a serious problem due to the lack of a clear legal system regarding the issue of accountability and transparency.

Due to the increasing acceptance of humanoid robots in the elderly care sector and also due to the growing trend of production of this type of robot in different countries, including Iran, considering the challenges in this field is essential. In this regard, educating families is necessary to increase the level of support for the elderly and pay attention to their concerns; also, the lack of specific regulations in the field of controlling the production of robots, as well as the need to compensate for the losses caused by the use of robots, has made legislating specific laws in this field even more important.