Voice assistants behind a generation of rude kids, artificial intelligence authorities say

TOP artificial intelligence officials are concerned voice assistants like Siri could be creating a generation of kids with bad manners.

IT turns out, Siri could be making kids rude.

Top artificial intelligence authorities, including representatives from Google and IBM, are concerned the growing number of voice assistants might be creating a generation without manners as they learn how to demand answers from computers without saying “please” or “thank you”.

Google revealed it would add its voice assistant to all modern smartphones this month, allowing users to demand answers from their phones with questions such as “dim the lights,” “what’s on my agenda tomorrow?,” and “navigate to the nearest newsagent”.

Google Assistant product director Gummi Hafsteinsson said adding conversational voice commands made sense as “conversations are the most natural interface we could think of”.

But he then conceded it could be creating a new problem with the younger generation, in particular.

Artificial intelligence authorities are concerned Siri could be creating a generation of rude kids. Picture: iStock

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“We’ve got to do something about that,” he said.

“A friend of mine posted on Facebook that his kids are starting to yell at them as parents ‘go, do this, do that, fetch me a sandwich’ because they’re learning through (computerised) assistants that that’s OK.

“It’s something we need to think about and take on as a challenge.”

Sage Group, a British multinational enterprise software company, artificial intelligence head Kriti Sharma said the issue could affect the way young computer users treat women, as many virtual assistants, including those from Google, Apple and Amazon, are programmed with “very typical female personas”.

While rudeness was an unintended consequence of adding voice services to phones and computers, she said ensuring children grow up with manners might rest with programmers in future as well as parents.

“If what it’s teaching the future generation of kids is you don’t have to say thank you and please and sorry any more, you just get what you want by saying it, it could drive human change and have some social impact,” Ms Sharma said.

Voice commands don’t encourage kids to use manners. Picture: iStock

“It also raises a point that as developers we need to care about that too, what kind of manners and social protocols they’re teaching and how do we redirect some of that.”

The challenge may become particularly important as AI assistants are launched just for children’s use.

Toy maker Mattel teamed with Nubi, a US technology manufacturing company, earlier this year to unveil a smart speaker that “grows with your child,” following them from the cot into the toddler years and beyond.

Mattel’s Aristotle starts as a baby monitor, with a connected camera, but when the child learns to speak, it is designed to recognise roughly articulated words and respond to queries about history or play games.

Aristotle will cost $US300 when it launches in the US in June, but its makers have yet to commit to how well mannered the device will be.