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About

Clifford Nass was a pioneering researcher at the intersection of human-computer interaction, social robotics, and communication technology. Best known for his foundational work on how humans apply social rules and expectations to computers and robots, Nass pushed the boundaries of what it means to interact with machines. His most influential contribution, "Can robots be teammates?" (2007, 297 citations), challenged prevailing assumptions about robot autonomy and human-robot collaboration, sparking important debates about the design of joint human-robot systems. His work extended into public attitudes toward robotic workers in "Beyond dirty, dangerous and dull" (2008, 183 citations), revealing nuanced societal expectations about where robots belong in the workforce. Nass also explored deeply personal dimensions of human-robot relationships, including identity formation in "I am my robot" (2009), and the social dynamics of disagreement and blame attribution between humans and computational agents. His 2002 panel on future interfaces foreshadowed a generation of social-emotional computing research. Across his career, Nass demonstrated that people instinctively treat machines as social actors — a deceptively simple insight with profound implications for interface design, robotics, and artificial intelligence development.