Sex Robots Aren't As Beneficial As The Claims Make Them Out To Be

Sex robots may be on the rise, but scientists say that claims of health and social benefits are wildly overstated.

Robots built to sate the sexual desires of consumers have been saturating the market and they're getting more and more realistic equipped with increasingly lifelike body parts and reactions. The marketing is also getting bolder with claims of emotional and mental benefits making its way to the public.

Sexbots Have No Proven Health Benefits

According to a report from The Guardian, there have been arguments endorsing the use of sex robots for its supposed health benefits. Some of the benefits that have been put forward include offering sexual companionship to the lonely and marginalized, as well as providing an outlet for the desires of pedophiles and other sex offenders.

Susan Bewley, a professor of women's health at Kings College London, tells Washington Post that doctors are even being asked for their professional opinions on these sexbots.

However, the lack of evidence reveals that there's little reason to believe these claims. In a paper published in the journal BMJ Sexual and Reproductive Health and co-authored by Bewley, researchers searched for scientific papers on the health effects of these dolls and found nothing to prove the assertions.

"Our conclusion is that there are a lot of health claims with no evidence," Bewley says in the Guardian. "In a way [this research] is a sort of academic plea [not to] make false claims, and if there is something genuine in this beyond the creation and marketing of a new device, then let's study it properly."

There are a few who suggest that the claims of sex dolls offering health benefits are actually intended to normalize the use of these robots.

Potential Negative Effects Of Sexbots

The use of robots could also backfire on the individuals who seek them out, creating a rift between partners or causing distress due to the robot's absence of emotion. Genuine desire is possible for humans towards robots, but the opposite cannot be true, Bewley and co-author Chantal Cox-George point out.

Furthermore, there is actually no existing evidence that these sex robots help keep pedophiles from targeting real children. The team cautions that it may even normalize the acts, fuel the desire, and increase the risk of going on to commit sexual harassment or assault.

"It might be true, it might be untrue," Bewley explains. "But the fact that someone who is selling these dolls is saying this, [means] you have to take [it] with a big pinch of salt."

Today, childlike dolls and sexbots that have a non-consensual mode are already in the market.