Long-Term Value of Social Robots through the Eyes of Expert Users

Abstract

Socially-enabled digital technologies have attracted academic interest for decades, with recent commercial examples of Siri and Alexa, capturing public attention. However, despite ubiquitous visions of a robotic future, very few fully-fledged social robots are currently available to consumers. To improve their designs, studies of their long-term use are particularly valuable, but are currently unavailable. To address this gap, we report on interviews with four long-term users of Pepper-a social robot introduced in 2014. Our thematic analysis elicited insights across three kinds of value Pepper brought to its users: utilitarian functionality; the community that formed around Pepper; and a personal value of affection. We focus on two contributions those values bring to social robot design: social robots as social proxies, alleviating disabilities or acting akin to social media profiles; and robot nurturing as a design construct, going beyond purely utilitarian or hedonistic perspectives on robots.

What Makes a Robot Social? A Review of Social Robots from Science Fiction to a Home or Hospital Near You

“…Dautenhahn and colleagues [ 22 ] show that participants in their studies did not see robots as companions or friends, but rather as useful household servants. Dereshev and colleagues [ 7 ] interviewed long-term, expert users of the Pepper robot (SoftBank Robotics; seen in Fig. 1 ).…”

“…While a human-like embodiment as a design feature for social robots is a powerful signal to users that the agent affords social interactions, it also makes the robot more prone to failing to deliver on high expectations regarding the nature of the interaction (e.g. [6][7][8]).…”

Can a humanoid robot continue to draw attention in an office environment?

“…[6]). However, some studies have pointed out that, in real-world applications, humans do not use commercial robots over long-term periods [7,8]. This is because humans often become bored with the robots, and the gap between the expectations of the user and their actual experience with the robot is too wide [9].…”

What Makes a Robot Social? A Review of Social Robots from Fiction to a Home or Hospital Near You

“…Many social robot developers have designed their creations to incorporate human characteristics, while at the same time being careful to avoid imitating human appearance or motion too closely, in order to avoid falling into the Uncanny Valley [5]. While a human-like embodiment as a design feature for social robots is a powerful signal to users that the agent affords social interactions, it also makes the robot more prone to failing to deliver on high expectations regarding the nature of the interaction (e.g., [6,7,8]).…”

“…Dautenhahn and colleagues [22] show that participants in their studies did not see robots as companions or friends, but rather as useful household servants. Dereshev and colleagues [7] interviewed long-term, expert users of the Pepper robot (SoftBank Robotics; seen in Figure 1). Their participants had lived and interacted with the robot on timescales ranging between 8 months to more than 3 years.…”