A New York University student came up with a novel way to test New Yorker's willingness to help strangers by using 10-inch tall cardboard robots that are lost and need help getting to their destinations.

"I wondered: could a human-like object traverse sidewalks and streets along with us, and in so doing, create a narrative about our relationship to space and our willingness to interact with what we find in it?" Kacie Kinzer, a Tisch School of the Arts student, said in a statement posted on her Website tweenbots.com.

"More importantly, how could our actions be seen within a larger context of human connection that emerges from the complexity of the city itself? To answer these questions, I built robots," Kinzer said.

The brown cardboard robots, dubbed tweenbots, can only go forward. Apparently using a black magic marker, Kinzer gave the tweenbot two large black dots for eyes and an upturned line for a smiling mouth. Then a tall flag with a note is attached stating where the robot's destination is and the tweenbots are sent out onto busy New York City sidewalks to find out if strangers will help the lost little robots get where they are going.

Kinzer has made some discoveries as her tweenbots traversed the city's streets as a helpless being that mirrored a vulnerable human that was lost and couldn't get where it was going without help.

Passers by rescued the tweenbots from potholes and other hazards, Kinzer wrote on her Website. Also, strangers refused to send the robot in the direction it was supposed to go if that route put the robot at peril. In no instance was a tweenbot harmed or lost.

Dan Nosowitz wrote about the experiment on Gizmodo The Gadget Blog.

"I don't know about you guys, but I like to think this project says more about the state of our nation than that stupid negative-nancy stock market," Nosowitz said. "It's just about the warmest, fuzziest thing I've seen since the last Muppet movie."