We’ve all instinctively clung to another person when frightened, if only as a child clutching our mother’s hand. But if that person is scared, too, this behavior may not have the desired calming effect. And a new study, published in the journal Emotion, suggests that a robot that mimics human breathing can also pass on frightened feelings.

The researchers developed round fluffy robots with motorized ribcages that can simulate breathing by expanding and contracting. More than 100 participants held these robots, which breathed in a stable pattern, in an accelerated “fearful” manner, or not at all, while the participants watched a scary clip from The Shining.

The team found that the heart rates of people holding hyperventilating robots increased the most, compared with those holding chilled-out or stationary robots. Participants reported that they perceived the robots as “afraid,” supporting the idea that they had “caught” the robot’s emotional state. “It’s the first study to show we can exacerbate emotion experiences using breathing robots,” says psychologist Zachary Witkower of the University of Amsterdam, who led the study. “It has implications for understanding human-robot interaction.”

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Interaction between humans and robots is usually studied through visual and spoken exchanges. “The touch aspect is novel and interesting,” says Eric Vanman, a psychologist at the University of Queensland in Australia, who studies human interaction with emerging technologies. “It’s probably going to cause other researchers to look at the information we get from touch.”

Additionally, participants holding steady-breathing robots showed slower heart rates. This difference wasn’t significant, but it suggests that contact with a steady breather might calm one’s emotions. Previous research supports this: “There’s evidence that touching animals and humans can have calming effects,” Vanman says.

If so, researchers could develop therapeutic devices that help us attain desired emotional states. “We’ve already started discussions with clinical psychologists,” Witkower says. “We’re focused on developing dynamic robots for regulating anxiety.” The work could also inspire wearable devices that safely boost thrilling experiences, such as video games and horror films, Vanman adds.

Vanman would like to see future studies measure respiration, to check whether the heart rate change is linked to people matching the robots’ breathing patterns, as well as other indicators. Witkower and his colleagues plan to track additional markers in future studies, and they hope to examine whether breathing robots could sense and react to human physiology automatically.

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