The theory of the “Uncanny Valley” established in the 1970s deals precisely with this balance problem. It mainly refers to robots with a human-like appearance and human-like motor skills.
In a thought experiment, Masahiro Mori put forward the thesis that affection for a robot increases steadily to a certain degree of human resemblance. If this critical degree is exceeded, the strong human resemblance triggers a feeling of uneasiness. This leads to an abrupt drop in affection and acceptance. Only when the design of the robot is perfected so that it looks deceptively like a human, a positive reaction from the human would be expected again.
Today, not many people interact with such anthropomorphic robots, but they do interact with voice assistants. Although they do not imitate a human appearance or movement, they do imitate other characteristics and abilities such as speech, emotion, character, and intelligent action. These human characteristics can also be classified in the Uncanny Valley paradigm.