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About

Eleonore Lumer investigates the intersection of social linguistics and human-robot interaction, focusing on how politeness, power dynamics, and social stereotypes shape communication with artificial agents. Her work challenges assumptions about designing robots that mimic human social norms, exploring whether strategies like indirect politeness or role-based deference are appropriate—or even expected—when interacting with machines. Lumer’s most cited paper, “Should robots be polite?” (15 citations), questions the necessity of politeness in human-robot dialogue, while her research on power and distance (8 citations) reveals how speaker-hearer relations influence perceptions of robotic behavior. She also examines the entanglement of human stereotypes with system biases, a critical issue in AI ethics. By modeling politeness as a complex linguistic phenomenon, Lumer highlights the risks of oversimplifying social communication in robot design. Her work is notable for bridging pragmatics, social psychology, and robotics, offering nuanced insights for creating more effective and socially aware AI. With a growing citation impact, Lumer’s research is essential for students and engineers designing robots that interact naturally—and ethically—with humans.