The Emotional Alignment Design Policy

Abstract We articulate and defend the Emotional Alignment Design Policy , according to which artificial entities should be designed to elicit emotional reactions from users that appropriately reflect the entities’ capacities and moral status, or lack thereof. This principle can be violated in two ways: by designing an artificial system that elicits stronger or weaker emotional reactions than its capacities and moral status warrant (overshooting or undershooting), or by designing a system that elicits the wrong type of emotional reaction (hitting the wrong target). Although the Emotional Alignment Design Policy is presumably attractive, practical implementation faces several challenges, including: how to respect user autonomy while promoting appropriate responses; navigating expert and public disagreement and uncertainty about facts and values; what to do if emotional alignment seems to require creating or destroying entities with moral status; and the extent to which designs should conform to, versus attempt to alter, user assumptions and attitudes.