Shihui Han

Peking University, McGovern Institute for Brain Research

Papers

Total Citations

H-Index

About

Shihui Han investigates the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying social perception, with a particular focus on how humans evaluate and empathize with humanoid robots. Her work bridges social neuroscience and human-robot interaction, exploring whether artificial agents elicit the same emotional and neural responses as humans. In her most-cited study (2024, 4 citations), she used behavioral measures and multimodal brain imaging to show that people do not empathize with humanoid robots in the same way they do with humans, revealing distinct neural signatures for empathy toward artificial versus human agents. A related study (2024, 3 citations) identified separable amygdala activation patterns during social evaluations of robots, suggesting that the brain processes robot-related social cues through specialized neural circuits. Her earlier work (2021, 2 citations) proposed that humanoid robots may be perceived as an evolutionary threat, drawing on science fiction narratives to frame empirical findings. Though her citation counts are modest, Han’s research is pioneering in its integration of affective neuroscience with emerging robotics technologies, offering critical insights for designing socially acceptable robots and understanding the boundaries of human empathy.